• Sylvanian Families painted rocks
    crafts - Friends of Sylvanian Families - Painted rocks - Pinty Plus Ambassador - tutorial

    Sylvanian Families painted rocks

    October 8, 2017 - By 

    My children are both going through a Sylvanian Families stage at the moment. It’s not hard to see why, the toys are super cute and perfect for open-ended play. Following our trip to the Sylvanian Families Shop in London a few weeks ago I have been on the look out for simple Sylvanian Families crafts we can do at home. As they also like decorating rocks we came up with our very own Sylvanian Families painted rocks! Equipment to make Sylvanian Families painted rocks smooth stones (we bought ours from the local garden centre) Chalkola Chalk Paint pens Black permanent pen…

  • Kid-friendly lavender wands
    Autumn - crafts

    Kid-friendly lavender wands {A-Z Play at Home}

    October 6, 2017 - By 

    I’m the first to admit I’m not a great gardener but the one thing we do have is a good supply of lavender. It’s one of my favourite plants and makes the garden smell gorgeous. It has a very pretty flower but what do you do with it once it’s flowered and over for the year? We’ve experimented with homemade lavender playdough before but for our weekly A-Z Play at Home blog series I thought we would harvest the flowers and try making lavender wands – a kid-friendly version. It is quite easy to harvest your lavender flowers. Once they have…

  • Autumn leaves sun catchers craft for kids
    Autumn - crafts - Nature crafts

    Autumn leaves sun catchers craft for kids

    October 5, 2017 - By 

    It’s been a while since we made any sun catchers but, along with the conkers my children keep picking up, they’ve brought home a lot of leaves too. We have a very short walk to the school gates but it seems like we walk past a lot of different trees. This seemed like the perfect opportunity to learn more about trees and leaves. Autumn leaves sun catchers craft for kids We used: fallen leaves picked up on our way to and from school white card contact paper coloured cellophane sheets scissors First we picked the leaves which were whole and…

  • How to make conker caterpillars
    Autumn - crafts

    How to make conker caterpillars

    October 4, 2017 - By 

    Every day we walk past a beautiful horse chestnut tree. Actually we walk past it four times on the way to drop my son off at Junior School then go on to Infant school. We’ve been picking up conkers for about 6 weeks and have a huge collection of all kinds of shapes and sizes. Sadly, the conkers have done nothing to deter the gigantic spiders which keep coming indoors. I’m not sure if that’s a myth or not, but I would gladly keep a few conkers around the house if they kept spiders away. We have so many conkers…

  • Papercut this book by Boo Paterson
    crafts - Paper craft - Paper cut art

    Papercut this book by Boo Paterson

    October 3, 2017 - By 

    It’s been a while since I reviewed any of my craft books. As you know, I love papercutting and bought myself a copy of Papercut This Book: techniques, templates and paper by Boo Paterson. Papercut this book by Boo Paterson Papercutting artist Boo Paterson shows you step-by-step how to craft your own intricate rainforests, jungles and the critters that live in them in this easy-to-follow, illustrative book. Learn how to cut and bring to life a variety of animals, from tigers to sloths, kangaroos to orangutans. This book includes everything you will need to get started clear instructions, templates for…

  • Making and hiding painted rocks
    crafts - Painted rocks

    Making and hiding painted rocks

    September 30, 2017 - By 

    I’ve mentioned a few times now that my kids have totally embraced the painted rocks phenomenon. They absolutely love decorating rocks and hiding them. It’s a fun hobby, a bit like geocaching but without the grid references. My children have been painting rocks at home. I bought a huge bag from the local garden centre and gave them a quick wash. My children love being creative so have been happily decorating rocks – first drawing their designs with pencil, then colouring them in with Posca pens. When they’ve finished I varnish them to make sure the designs don’t come off…

  • Halloween roasted vegetables
    crafts - Halloween crafts

    Halloween roasted vegetables {A-Z Play at Home}

    September 29, 2017 - By 

    I love Fridays. We have a fun weekend planned with the kids. Can you believe we’ve already reached letter V in our weekly A-Z Play at Home blog hop? The letter V made me think of vegetables, something we always have plenty of at home. We’ve used vegetables in our crafting before and today we wanted to try something a bit different. With Halloween coming up soon we made our own Halloween roasted vegetables! Halloween roasted vegetables I don’t usually have a problem getting my kids to eat their veggies. Thankfully they eat well, but it can never hurt to make…

  • Amazing Creatures book review and giveaway
    competition - crafts

    Amazing Creatures book review and giveaway

    September 27, 2017 - By 

    I’ve always loved adult colouring books and my children do too. We were recently introduced to a lovely book we’ve all been fighting over. Amazing Creatures by Shobhna Patel is a gorgeous colouring book but goes one step further as you can turn your coloured pictures into 3D sculpture artworks. The whole family loves colouring in and Amazing Creatures contains 24 different pages, full of amazing animals, to colour in. Once you have created your finished coloured sheet you can push up the ready cut flaps from behind the page to create simple lift-the-flaps. To add more interest you can also curl the…

  • Halloween teacake spider treats
    crafts - Halloween crafts

    Halloween teacake spider treats

    September 25, 2017 - By 

    I’ve been excited by the thought of Halloween for a while now. We actually went on a little Halloween shopping spree a few weeks ago and I couldn’t help but be excited by some Halloween crafting with the children. Today I’m joining up with some other bloggers and taking part in a Halloween Blog Hop organised by The Moments at Home. Our Halloween craft is Halloween teacake spider treats. I love teacakes and they can be decorated in so many ways throughout the changing seasons – see our teacake Christmas puds here. Teacake spiders are fun and taste delicious too! Halloween…