Yesterday I told you about some of the crafts we had been making with some lovely Christmas craft kits from Baker Ross. They make some great gingerbread products and I couldn’t resist buying more craft supplies for the children. Today Little Sis wanted to make something. Mornings are our time and after we had read books and played My Little Pony we were able to sit down and make something together. Much as I love to think about the things I want to make and take my time over them, my children are happy with quick and easy crafts. I…
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I love Autumn and I’m happy that I seem to have passed on a love of seasons to my children too. They have really embraced Autumn this year. My 3 year old can’t walk past a leaf or acorn without picking it up and my freezer is full of little bags of acorns after I found a little maggot crawling out of one! Last month we went to our first proper Apple Day event, held at Hughenden Manor, our local National Trust place. Did you know that 21st October 2015 marked the 25th anniversary of Apple Day – first initiated…
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November means I can officially start my Christmas preparations. I’ve started writing lists and am feeling pretty on top of everything at the moment. I know there will be lots of Christmas crafting and last week we made our first Christmas craft – gingerbread play dough hearts. Have you seen the decorated gingerbread hearts hanging up in Christmas markets? They always look so pretty, decorated with coloured icing, and wrapped in pretty cellophane bags. I thought it would be fun to make our own version so today I’m sharing a tutorial for them. Read on because I’m also taking part in…
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This year my 5 year has started studying Science as a subject at school. He’s been coming home full of stories so I thought we could try some simple science experiments at home. As it’s Halloween our first experiment has been to grow our own Monster salt crystals. It’s surprisingly easy so I thought I would show you how we did it. You will need: A saucepan Epsom Salts Food colouring Empty glass jar with the label removed Large metal washer Wooden stirrer Bakers twine How to grow your own Monster salt crystals: Tie a metal washer to a length of…
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I posted a few pics of our gingerbread house on Instagram yesterday and got comments saying I was far too early for Christmas! Since when was a gingerbread house just for Christmas? I think they make a pretty good treat for Halloween too as they are really versatile and easy to decorate for any season. Decorating a Halloween gingerbread house As we’re currently in the middle of half term we decorated a gingerbread house as part of our Halloween celebrations. This is always a great activity to do with my children and it kept them occupied all afternoon. It also…
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I know that we are yet to celebrate Halloween but we have been busy thinking about crafts for Bonfire Night too. The other day we experimented with paper plate fireworks and today we wanted to share our cardboard tube rockets. To make cardboard tube rockets you will need: Cardboard tubes Metallic paint and paint brushes Card Star stickers Ribbon Plasticene How to make cardboard tube rockets: We painted our tubes with gold and silver metallic paint. Whilst they were drying we cut circles from cardboard to make the tops, painting them with the gold and silver paint too. When they had…
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Little Sis and I have been going to our local Creation Station for a couple of weeks. She loves to craft and has been enjoying trying something new each week. This week she was experimenting with air drying clay and ended up making a lovely tea light holder which is perfect for celebrating divali. How to make a Divali lamp made with air drying clay First Little Sis was given a lump of air drying clay to play with. She was happy rolling it in her hands and adding a little bit of water to make it wet and malleable.…
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I love sharing the crafts I enjoyed as a child with my own children. I’ve seen plenty of scratch art kits around but nothing beats making your own from scratch – sorry, couldn’t resist. Equipment needed to make your own scratch paper Card Wax crayons Black acrylic paint Washing up liquid Sponge How to make your own scratch paper Cover your sheet of card with the crayon. You can do this anyway you like. My 5 year old carefully coloured small squares of colour, my 3 year old was less structured and demanded I finish it off for her.…
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You may have thought we were running out of Autumnal crafts as we seem to be crafting a lot but I have a new one to share today. I finally got round to trying leaf printing on air drying clay. I like air drying clay, it’s really versatile and I wanted to do something with the leaves my 3 year old keeps giving me. Equipment to make leaf-printed air drying clay decorations Air drying clay Leaves Rolling pin Greaseproof paper Circular cookie cutter Gold and silver metallic paint How to make leaf-printed air drying clay decorations I rolled out…