• Sheep sun catcher for Chinese New Year
    Chinese New Year crafts - Kids crafts - tutorial

    Sheep sun catcher for Chinese New Year

    January 17, 2015 - By 

    I have to admit that we don’t celebrate Chinese New Year but that doesn’t stop us having fun with crafting around the theme. We’ve already made a Chinese lantern sun catcher but did you know that 2015 is the Year of the Sheep? We thought we’d make a sheep sun catcher. Our windows are full but there’s always room for one more, right? Materials needed to make a sheep sun catcher: Black paper Contact paper White tissue paper Scissors How to make a sheep sun catcher: I drew a sheep on a piece of paper and used this as a…

  • Kids crafts - playing - tutorial

    No sew bean bags

    January 16, 2015 - By 

    As much as my children love their toys I’ve found we can often have just as much fun with toys which cost pennies. This week my 4 year old has spent hours on his cardboard box city and today I wanted to share our no sew bean bags with you. Materials needed to make no sew bean bags: Duck or duct tape Craft seal-able bags Lentils Scissors How to make no sew bean bags: I bought a bag of lentils from my local health shop and divided it into three craft bags. I did this just in case my no…

  • Valentine calm down jar
    Kids crafts - tutorial - Valentines Day crafts

    Valentine calm down jar

    January 14, 2015 - By 

    My 3 year old has a tendency to stamp her foot and shout “I’m not happy” when she’s not getting her own way. Sometimes both my children need to take a step back. My Pinterest boards are full of calm down jars and I thought they looked fun to make and worth a try. This is kid-friendly, a great activity for re-using old glass jars and the other art supplies for kids are easily available. Materials needed to make a Valentine calm down jar: Red glitter glue Empty jar with the label removed Warm water Selection of heart shaped buttons…

  • Chinese lantern sun catcher
    Chinese New Year crafts - Kids crafts - tutorial

    Chinese lantern sun catcher

    January 13, 2015 - By 

    My children love to make sun catchers. They are so quick and easy to set up and they are my go to craft if one of them asks to make something and I don’t want to think about it too much. With Chinese New Year around the corner I set up a sweet Chinese lantern sun catcher activity for my 3 year old daughter yesterday. Material needed to make a Chinese lantern sun catcher: Paper Scissors Cellophane squares Contact paper How to make a Chinese lantern sun catcher: First draw your Chinese lantern. I drew mine with a black Sharpie…

  • Kids crafts - playing - tutorial

    Simple noughts and crosses with toys

    January 9, 2015 - By 

    The weather has take a turn for the worst recently so we’ve been stuck indoors more than we’d like. Over the Christmas holidays the children really started to enjoy playing family games. They don’t always grasp the rules and sometimes there’s a little cheating going on but it’s great to see them having fun with indoor games and learning new skills. Yesterday we had fun with simple noughts and crosses but we made it a little different by using the children’s toys and making a large washi tape grid on the floor! Noughts and crosses, or tic-tac-toe, is usually played…

  • paper wreath tutorial - the gingerbread house
    Paper craft - Recycled crafts - tutorial

    Recycled wrapping paper wreath tutorial

    January 7, 2015 - By 

    I’m pretty astounded by the amount of rubbish we recycling this Christmas holiday. Although we had our extended family at our house we still had an embarrassing amount of bags to put out, not helped by the fact we skipped a collection due to the Bank Holidays. I try to re-use items from the recycling as much as possible and made some sweet paper wreaths from recycled wrapping paper. Today I am going to share my recycled wrapping paper origami wreath tutorial with you. A while ago I was sent one of these as part of a craft swap and…

  • Kids crafts - tutorial

    Playdough acorns and the best posts of 2014

    January 2, 2015 - By 

    2014 was an interesting year. My 4 year old started school full-time and our crafting adventures are now squeezed into after school and weekends. Fortunately he hasn’t lost his appetite for crafting and we’ve had fun experimenting with all kinds of materials and techniques. My 3 year old also has the crafting bug and I’m so happy whenever I hear them ask to craft. My favourite post of 2014 has to be our playdough acorns. We love to craft the seasons and both children loved Autumn, watching the leaves change colour and drop. We were inspired to craft and look…

  • New Year paper plate kids craft
    Kids crafts - New Year crafts - tutorial

    Celebrating the New Year with children

    December 30, 2014 - By 

    How do you explain the concept of time and a New Year to a 4 year old? He recognises all his numbers and understands days, weeks and months but not a year. I wanted to mark the arrival of a New Year so came up with the idea of paper plate numbers to hopefully reinforce the idea a little. We talked about time and how we measure it, then drew the numbers on four paper plates. We ‘coloured’ them in using some left over craft sand, covering the number with glue and then shaking the sand over each one. The…

  • New Year's confetti box
    crafts - Kids crafts - New Year crafts - tutorial

    New Year’s confetti boxes

    December 28, 2014 - By 

    Even on Boxing Day my children wanted to do some crafting! Luckily we were at home so we were able to raid our craft supplies to make some sweet confetti boxes for New Year’s Eve. There’s no way my children will be staying up to see in the New Year but that doesn’t mean we don’t want to mark it in some way. Stay tuned for a couple more New Year’s crafts I’ll be sharing this week. Equipment needed to make New Year’s confetti boxes: plain match boxes assortment of coloured paper paper punches foam stickers How to make New…