Surviving through our new normal--Toilet Paper Roll Craft Round Up & More!

The world is a scary place and has gotten a whole lot scarier the last few weeks. I believe we are truly afraid of the unknown. We do not know who will get the Coronavirus, who will die from it and what will happen during this time. There are predictions but it is scary. Now we are dealing with this stress and fear and our kids are home with us because it isn't safe to have them at school. And then there is the whole stores wiped out of toilet paper (and other things) going on. Craziness! 

Easy DIY Napkin Rings -- a Crafty Weekends Craft & Link Party

We are having a fun Independence Day week and are planning a barbecue. I found these fun patriotic napkins  at  Target for $3. I thought it would be fun to make some simple napkin rings for them. These are really easy and cheap. And completely disposable. I used a toilet paper roll and a piece of scrapbook paper. I cut the toilet paper roll into fourths (one-inch each). Then I cut one-inch strips of the scrapbook paper and glued them on. 

The Adventure Bible Book of Daring Deeds and Epic Creations Review

Disclosure: I was sent this book in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own. The links are affiliate links where I will receive a small percentage of any purchases made through them at no cost to you. Thank you for supporting Crafty Moms Share!

Do you look for ways for your child to understand the Bible but have fun? Want some everyday activities and crafts that tie into lessons from the Bible? I have the book for you! It is The Adventure Bible Book of Daring Deeds and Epic Creations by Sherry Kyle. 

Crafts from Recycled Materials (Valentine Themed) -- Crafty Weekends Review & Link Party

Disclosure: I was sent these products to review free of charge from Quarto Books USA. All opinions in this post are my own. I did not receive any other compensation for this review. I am including links to each item for your convenience but do not receive anything if you purchase them.

Happy New Year!! Crafty Weekends has been on hold for a few weeks due to the holidays and Hazel's birthday parties. We are back this week with a review of two great children's craft books using things from your recycle bin!! I put a Valentine's Day twist onto the ones I made. I am also providing you with some free printable Valentines in case you do not want to make the crafts to go with them. 

Make Your Own Zoo -- Crafty Weekends

Disclosure:  Ryland Peters & Small sent me a copy of this book free of charge to review. All opinions in my review are my own and I did not receive any other compensation. As in all my reviews I am providing links for your ease, but receive no compensation.

We are definitely having a crafty weekend at my house. Hazel and I finished up some of the fun zoo animals from Make Your Own Zoo by Tracey Radford and worked on some Christmas gifts as well as doing the free craft at Lakeshore Learning. 

 This post however will focus on our zoo animals and this great book. Hazel was so excited to get started on these. She actually tried to make some herself, but got a little confused. It is definitely kid projects but a six-year-old needs some help with them. We of course had to make the flamingo.

50 Animal Crafts for Little Kids - Book Review

Disclosure: I was sent a this ebook to review free of charge from Georgina Bomer. All opinions in this post are my own. I did not receive any other compensation for this review. I am including links to each item for your convenience but do not receive anything if you purchase them.

Continuing on our theme of National Craft Month, we are reviewing another wonderful craft book, 50 Animal Crafts for Little Kids by Georgina Bomer. This book is available in now out of print.

Poetry, Trees and Bees

April is National Poetry Month and last Friday, April 18th was Arbor Day. We have been doing things for both of these and today I thought I would share them. A few weeks ago Hazel got her first (and second) bee sting. I went to the library looking for books on bees. The children's librarian suggested some poetry including Unbeelievables by Douglas Florian.

This book has various poems about bees and then gives details about the information shared in the poem. It is a wonderful way for children to learn more about the positive sides of bees. We learned that male bees do not sting, only females do. The male bees or drones main purpose in life is to fertilize the queen bee's eggs. 

While in the poetry section I found a few more poetry books to check out. We really enjoyed reading Butterfly Eyes and Other Secrets of the Meadow by Joyce Sidman. There would be two poems with the question of "Who am I?" or something similar at the end and then the next pages would give details about the animals or things that were described in the poems. Hazel asked to get this one out again.

We also got a few others out that we have not read yet. They are Fold Me a Poem by Kristine O'Connell George (I wanted to try the origami with Hazel), Insectlopedia: Poems and Paintings by Douglas Florian and Seeds, Bees, Butterflies and More! Poems for Two Voices by Carole Gerber (the librarian recommended this one).

Last Thursday the craft at the library was in honor of Arbor Day on Friday. I did not take Hazel with me since she was spending the day with Nonni, but I saw what they did and knew we could do it at home. Hazel also happened to ask last week to learn more about trees, so I was actually going to the library to look for books on trees. The craft was to cut a toilet paper roll in half and glue it down as your trunk. Then use green tissue paper for the leaves and they had sequins for flowers or apples or whatever. I used buttons. I gave Hazel lots of supplies to choose from and she came up with her own version. I did mine after her, so she would not get any ideas from me.

I found some stories about trees which we have been enjoying. 

Picture a Tree by Barbara Reid, we actually did artwork with this book last summer. Mighty Tree by Dick Gackenbach is a story about four tree seeds and what happens to each tree. One tree remains and keeps spreading its seeds. One thing I did not like is the seeds looked like maple seeds and the tree looked like a pine. The Family Tree by David McPhail is a wonderful tale about a boy who saves the tree, that his ancestors left when they built their farm, from being taken down for the road. Someday a Tree by Eve Bunting is about a tree that a family loves and they discover one day that it has been poisoned. The community comes together to help them try to save the tree, but it is too late. The girl however plants some of the acorns she collected from the tree near the dying tree so someday there will be another great oak.

We also took some books out to learn about trees. We have not read them yet, but the two above I think will be best. They are Be a Friend to Trees by Patricia Lauber and Tell Me, Tree All about Trees for Kids by Gail Gibbons.

So that is what we have been up to. Have you read any good children's poetry this month or learned about trees?

Happy New Year!

I know I promised to keep posting and somehow between Hazel and I being sick (Hazel still is) and Hazel's birthday party, I feel like every time I sit down to write I just want to go to sleep and I didn't want to write a bad post, so I waited. So this is a bit late, but I thought I would share about New Year's Eve and Day with you. How did you celebrate? Did you celebrate?

Did you know there are different times of the year that people in the world celebrate New Years? Hazel and I took some books out from the library to let her know more about New Year's and I have learned so much reading them. The first one is Happy New Year! by Emery Bernhard. This book gives a bit of history of New Year's and how it has been celebrated throughout the times. It also goes into the ways different cultures have and some still do celebrate it and when. It even discusses the change of the calendar to make January 1st the new year introduced by Julius Caesar. (This is the reason on months do not match their prefixes by the way.) Caesar changed the beginning of the year to January instead of March. By the way if you are in Rome on New Year's Eve, watch out for dropping crockery. Their tradition is to throw their cracked or chipped crockery out the window at midnight. Noise-making was originally meant to scare away evil spirits. In Bali it still is. On New Year's do you celebrate the new year or say goodbye to the old one? Each culture seems to differ on this as well. 

The other books we took out (so far) are craft books. We have Holiday Handiwork by Gillian Souter. For New Year's it has a noise-maker craft as well as a dancing dragon for the Chinese New Year. By the way the Chinese New Year and other lunar new years (like  Vietnamese and Korean) will be January 31st this year. This year the Tibetan New Year is March 2nd; the Persian New Year is March 21st; the Hindu New Year is March 31st; the Hmong New Year is April 12th; and the Jewish New Year (Rosh Hashanah) is September 25th. (Source of dates)

Our third book is Happy New Year, Everywhere! by Arlene Erlbach. This book shares information about the new year in twenty different countries as well as a craft/project to do from that country. This book is wonderful for teaching about different cultures! And the activities look so fun!

This year is the first year we actually "celebrated" New Year's Eve with Hazel. We went to our local library. They had some crafts and a countdown to noon. Then they played fireworks on a large screen television and had the kids jump on bubble wrap (it sounded like fireworks). Then they served sparkling cider and fish crackers. Hazel had so much fun. Oh, and the librarians had a balloon drop at noon for the kids too. Each child could make three crafts. The first was a New Year's crown. They used some Grinch crowns they had.

Then they had an egg shaker with plastic Easter eggs, popcorn kernels, decorative tape and stickers. Every child needed one to shake at noon!

The final craft was a homemade kazoo. It is made with a toilet paper roll, tissue paper, rubber band and a hole punch. Punching the hole is key to it working.

Hazel had so much fun!! She did not want to leave. Luckily we were headed out for a nice lunch with her grandmother at Hazel's favorite restaurant so we got her out of there.

And to make it even more interesting for you here are a few fun New Year's traditions I found on-line:

• In the Netherlands, they burn their Christmas trees in bonfires to get rid of the old and welcome the new. They also have fireworks.
• In Spain they eat twelve grapes at midnight to secure twelve months of happiness.
• In Japan they host "forget-the-year" parties in December and then on New Year's Eve the buddhist priests 108 times to expel the 108 human weaknesses. 
• In Brazil it is customary to wear all white except also brightly colored underwear. It is customary in Ecuador, Chile, Bolivia and Venezuela to wear brightly colored underwear. Yellow is supposed to bring money and red brings love.
• In Chile, they eat a spoonful of lentils at midnight to have a year of work and money.
• In South Africa, they throw old appliances out their windows.

Source

http://www.infoplease.com/spot/newyearcelebrations.html

http://www.latinopost.com/articles/2498/20131226/new-years-eve-2014-oddest-new-years-eve-traditions-from-around-the-world.htm

Now I would love to hear your family's traditions.

Homemade String Instruments

Today I am going to share our homemade string instruments. Now as I posted earlier this month, Hazel loves playing her ukulele, so when she saw we could make one in Nifty Thrifty Music Crafts by Felicia Lowenstein Niven, she wanted to make one right away. Our problem was we did not have an empty cereal box. However when I did my kitchen cupboard clean out I had several cracker boxes, so we used one of those. We also used a paper towel roll, paint, tape, stickers and rubber bands.

I cut a hole in the cracker box and Hazel painted both the box and the tube. Then we taped the tube onto the box. We used duct tape that matched the color we painted. She also decorated it with stickers. The book suggested painting designs, but that is above my four-year-old's ability. Then we added four rubber bands. It was set to play.

She prefers her real one though for the sound is a bit better.

Then last Saturday the free craft at Lakeshore Learning Store was to make a paper plate and bowl guitar or that is what the company called it. We called it a banjo as did several of the employees at our local store. 

This was an easy craft. You need a paper bowl, a paper plate the same size as the bowl, a tongue depressor, rubber bands, glue and markers, stickers, etc. for decorations. The kids glued the plate onto the bowl with the tongue depressor glued in between the two.

Then the decorated the plate and tongue depressor. Next the person running the craft put the rubber bands on. And that is all there is to this one.

So we hope you enjoy making some simple string instruments!

Virtual Flat Stanley in the Netherlands

So last week I introduced our Virtual Flat Stanley Series. Flat Stanley is based on the book, Flat Stanley by Jeff Brown. There are now a series of these easy reader books about a boy named Stanley who is made flat when a bulletin board falls on him during the night. He is flat and small enough to be mailed in an envelope to travel.

Now this series began because my aunt emailed me a couple of weeks ago to help her step-granddaughter with her school Flat Stanley project. The Flat Stanley template they mailed to England never got returned, so she had nothing for the project. Since I live in the same state, I thought it might be fun for her to have some from around the world--even if they were just pictures due to time constraints. I e-mailed a few blogger friends and got a few responses. Now we are opening it up to anyone who wants to participate. You can get more information here.

Today Flat Stanley is in the Netherlands!

The first person who responded to my request was from E Strea Chikitu in the Netherlands. For those who have not had the pleasure of visiting this wonderful blog, you will often see her beautiful creations there--often crocheted and she even gives the patterns sometimes. Oh, how I wish I could crochet better. I may attempt it again after seeing her beautiful creations.

Now some information about this particular Flat Stanley:

On April 30th our queen handed over her crown to her oldest son. And so we have a new King this week.Our oldest daughter gave Stanley woodden shoes and Dutch National colors so he will be ready to celebrate The Crowningsday.Stanley is in our front yard with Rozemarijn. We put out the flag since it's our new Kings birthday today.

This picture is for the prince becoming king.

You can see more pictures of honoring the new king at E Chikitu Strea .

Hazel and I wanted to explore The Netherlands a bit more. After all the whole point of this series to learn more about other places. Luckily we had a few books from the library and found some crafts and coloring pages at DLTK's Crafts for Kids. The first book we have out is Easy Breakfasts From Around the World by Sheila Griffin Llanas. Now we had this book for Around the World in 12 Dishes, so you will see it again soon as we do our post about Finland.

This book is wonderful because it gives a little introduction to each country and then an easy recipe for a breakfast there. So our breakfast from the Netherlands was Anijsmelk and Hagelslag. Anijsmelk is warm milk flavored with anise seeds and honey or sugar. Hazel loved it!! I was actually surprised at how good it was since I am not usually a fan of anise seeds. Then Hagelslag is toast with chocolate sprinkles on it. Now we didn't have any chocolate sprinkles, but we had leftover Christmas sprinkles so we used those.

We also had some Gouda cheese. We made Hazel's toast and cheese into butterflies. We happened to use whole wheat cinnamon raisin bread for the toast. Oh, and we cut up some apple since breakfast in our house is not complete without some fruit.

Crushing the Anise Seeds

Hazel enjoyed playing chef. We made this when she stayed home with a cold the other day, so it gave her something fun to do in the morning.

Stirring the Anijsmelk

Spreading butter on the toast

Her favorite part was of course putting on the sprinkles. I have to admit we had red and green sprinkles all over our kitchen after this breakfast.

We also wanted to learn a bit about the culture. We did some coloring pages where we saw the wooden clogs similar to the ones on Flat Stanley as well as windmills and tulips. Plus of course a map and a flag.

We also made a windmill from a toilet paper roll. We got his craft from DLTK.

Steven was surprised when Hazel told him about the windmills in the Netherlands. 

We also took out of the library Birthdays Around the World by Mary D. Lankford. Now since one of Hazel's dolls or stuffed animal has a birthday every day, we can say she loves birthdays. So I thought she might enjoy hearing some of the customs in other countries. This book gives a little introduction about each country as well. For example it tells us at The Netherlands means the low lands. It also goes into how the windmills were used to pump water from the land. Now they use diesel and electric pumps.

In the Netherlands, the family often decorates a birthday chair. They may use garland called slingers. The birthday child often gets to choose the food for the evening meal and stays up later than usual. Traditionally they have very rich and elaborate pastries called gebakjes. A birthday cake is served without candles. For a very large or special birthday they may have an ice cream cake. A game often played at a party is Koekhappen. Children are blindfolded and try to eat a soft cookie hanging on a string. Another traditional birthday game is Zacdoekje Leggen or Drop the Handkerchief. Children sit in a circle and one child is It. The It child walks around the circle and if they catch someone not paying attention they drop the handkerchief behind that child and then that child has to chase the It child around the circle. If they tag the It child they get to sit back down, but if the It child makes it back to the empty spot in the circle, the new child is It. Editorial Note: I have been informed that the family with this wonderful Flat Stanley does put candles in the birthday cakes.

So that is what we learned while Flat Stanley is in the Netherlands. We hope you will join us next week to see where Flat Stanley is visiting.

Flat Stanley's Travels

Fairy Tales in Different Cultures--Cinderlad

With it being St. Patrick's Day, I wanted to share another Irish Cinderella. If you missed my post last week sharing Fair, Brown and Trembling, you can check it out and on it I shared some information about Ireland. Since I already shared the information there, I'm going to skip that part of this post. So this week's story is a bit different. It is called Cinderlad. The book we read is by Shirley Climo. The first major difference is the Cinderella character is male. And he saves a princess from death, but that is getting ahead of ourselves.

This book begins with the birth of a baby boy. His mother names him Becan, which means "little one" in Irish. Becan's feet grew unusually large, but he remained relatively short. His mother died while he was young. His father who was a peddler was away often and would bring back what was needed. One day he came back with a new wife and her three almost grown daughters. Then he went off to work again. The stepmother and her daughters watched Becan and always blamed everything on him. The daughters called him Little Big Foot. Eventually the stepmother got sick of having him around and sent him off to be a herdboy for the cows. Becan was fine with this however he was afraid of the tales he heard about the large speckled bull who could kill a man by kicking him. 

One day the bull arrived at the field where Becan took his father's cows. Becan scratched him in the same place the cows liked to be scratched and they became friends. Becan would tell the bull about his problems and one day the bull talked back. He told Becan he would not starve while he was around and told him to pull out what was in his ear. This was an amazing meal wrapped in a table cloth. After that every day the bull would come at lunch time to feed Becan. He stopped accepting the scraps his stepmother offered for dinner and she became suspicious. She sent her eldest daughter to spy on him to see who was feeding him. The daughter came home and reported to the mother. The mother told her they would kill the bull and have a nice stew. Becan heard everything although they thought he was asleep. 

At day break Becan ran off to warn his friend. The bull told him to jump on his back and they would escape. The traveled a long way until the bull stopped and told Becan that this is where they would say goodbye. He told him a grey bull would come to fight him and the grey bull would kill him. When he died he told Becan to twist off his extra long tail and wear it as a belt. Becan should use it whenever he needed the bull the most. Becan was horrified at this thought, but the bull insisted. All happened as the speckled bull said. The grey bull arrived and they fought all day. At days end the speckled bull was dead and the grey bull had disappeared. Becan cried all night by his friend then remembering what he said he easily twisted off his tail and wrapped it around his body twice as a belt. Then he reached in his ear one more time and pulled out the white table cloth and covered the bull with it. Then he wandered off on his own. 

While walking on his own, his feet hurt (he was barefoot) and eventually a gentleman offered him a ride on his horse. When Becan told him he was going anywhere he offered Becan a job as a herdboy. The gentleman warned him that his next door neighbor was an arhach (a giant) and told him to stay on his side of the fence. Becan always wanted to see a giant, so he did not listen. When the horse, cows, sheep and donkey had eaten all the grass on the gentleman's side of the fence, Becan climbed up and saw that the giant had lots of grass and apple trees. He knocked down some of the stones of the fence so the animals could pass over it and then they all went to where there was food. The giant arrived and almost killed Becan until he remembered his bull tail belt.

The bull tail wrapped itself around the giant's neck. The giant begged for him to remove it and Becan said he only would if the giant gave him his boots and disappeared forever. The giant gave Becan his boots which fit him perfectly and also dropped his sword which Becan picked up and wore in his belt.

One day the gentleman warned Becan to stay close to home because it was Dragon Day in Kinsale. He explained that every year the dragon came out of the ocean and ate the most fair maiden. If the fairest maiden was not tied to the post to be eaten the dragon would make the water swell over the entire town. This year the fairest maiden was the king's own daughter, Princess Finola. Well of course, Becan went off to see what was going to happen. He rode the man's donkey to town and saw the princess tied to a post. Everyone around her ignored her cries for help and would not look at her. Then he said he would fight for her. And the dragon appeared.

He and the dragon fought for a long time. His arm got tired of swinging the giant's sword. When he pricked the dragon with it, the dragon acted like it was a minor pinprick. Then Becan remembered the bull's tail and pulled it off. It magically wrapped itself around the dragon's jaws and the dragon returned to the sea with the tail.

Princess Finola wanted to thank him, but at the same time he heard his three stepsisters call out "Little Big Foot" and he wanted to escape. Princess Finola reached out for him and grabbed his boot. He rode the donkey away having lost one boot. Princess Finola announced she would only marry the man who fit the boot since he was the only one who had helped her. The king sent a messenger out looking for the man who fit the boot. It was a year before the messenger arrived at the gentleman's house. The gentleman tried it on and it slid right off. Then he told the messenger to let the boy try it on. The messenger didn't think a herdboy would be the one, but let him do it anyway. Of course it fit and Becan told them he had its mate in the cowshed. Becan rode the gentleman's horse to the castle where Princess Finola waited for him. She commented on how they were the same height so they would see eye-to-eye on things and told him he would now be Prince Becan. They got married and lived happily ever after.

Our crafts for this book were of course our peg dolls and then we used DLTK toilet paper roll crafts for the bull and the dragon. We used a paper towel roll for the giant and just made it ourselves. 

Later this week we will be sharing more Irish cooking and hope you will join us. Tomorrow we will feature the first of this month's Virtual Book Club for Kids posts and it will include a giveaway. Please come see and enter!!

Source