Spring Fevers, Colds and Crafts.

The past few days have been cold, wet and snowy-and the kids have had colds, been whiney and snotty, such an appealing combination.  Everyone has been spending extra time in their jammies and wrapped up in various blankies.  To go along with their colds I've been dealing with a fever..spring fever I think.
   I needed to find some things to keep them occupied and give me a sense of accomplishment.  I've seen all sorts of crafts involving toilet paper rolls these days, but not so much kid crafts.  Seeing as we go through what seems like an unrealistic amount of toilet paper for a family of 5, we have lots of empty rolls around.  I will point out that there has been a large amount of nose blowing with the T.P. lately too, that might have something to do with the extra rolls!
  The first little project I decided on was a snake -what is it with kids' obsession with snakes anyway?  I took a couple rolls and cut them in a diagonal spiral, not really following the seam, that would make a really short and fat snake...I tried that first!  On one end of the spiral I did a little free-form snake head with a tongue(a little piece of ribbon would make a cute tongue too though).  I set up the munchkins at the table with markers-and a blank paper underneath- and let them color their custom snake friends!

Deciding on colors.

Even 'Tinkerbell' loves snakes!

 

The coloring actually kept them busy for quite a while, they wanted them to look just right!  Once their snakes were colored they had lost a little of their curliness.  To get it back I rolled them up and set them inside of a jar for a little while....they regained their twirl and the kids wore them like bracelets!  As they gradually stretched back out, they became little pets that ended up joining us at the table for lunch and dinner.....a little weird, but so are my kids!

Crafty supplies out and ready!

 Well we were on a 'roll' (hee hee hee), so I decided to try another T.P. roll craft.  This time we made bracelets on purpose.   So, first I cut a slit from one end to the other and then cut three equal-ish pieces from side to side.  Since I wanted these bracelets to hold their curve shape a little better than the snakes did I decided to not have the kids color directly onto the cardboard.  Instead I traced the shape onto colored paper of their choice and let them decorate to their little hearts' content.  It would have been fun to have stickers, but I haven't found my sticker stash yet.  Once they had their coloring done(and added words or pictures with the help of momma) I cut out the rectangle and glued it onto the piece of tube.  We could have stopped here and called it good....but I like to complicate things!  I also like to make things that will (hopefully) last longer than a day.  I am a BIG fan of super tape.  You know, the clear tape on the huge roll.  I have a habit of 'self-laminating' many projects.  It can get annoying if your tape strips move or stick to each other in the wrong way, but hey it's way cheaper than a trip to the copy center to get things laminated!

The 'tape sandwich'.

Trim the tape about 1/8 inch from the edge.

So,all that being said, it was tape time!  Taking a strip of tape a little longer than the bracelet, lay the tape sticky side up on the table and place the bracelet on top.  Taking another piece of tape gently stick it to one end of the bracelet and slide it up the inside-sticking it to sticky side of the first tape....basically a tape sandwich with cardboard in the middle.  Honestly, that's the hard part.  Then just trim the edges and grab your hole punch!  Punch a hole in each end and tie a small piece of yarn or ribbon through the hole.  Ta-Da!  Fun little bracelets, or maybe more like arm-cuffs, either way.  They are cute and the kids love that they made them........well, kinda.  ;-)  

Custom bracelet designed by the Cub.

So much style on little arms!

Pile of fun bracelets ready to share!

   Ok, one more little tid-bit of fun from the past few days at our house.  Yesterday morning the kids were feeling generally yucky and needed distraction.  Feeling a little less than inspired I wandered over to Pinterest to find some......not like I need an excuse to wander onto Pinterest!
   Well, the first thing I came across looked just about perfect.  A free'build your own cupcake' printable!  So perfect, on so many levels-first of all, it's free, and second, it has to do with baking-the obsession of my little people!  Yay!!  So after printing out these adorable things I spent the next hour cutting them out....takes a lot longer to do things when I always decide to make double!  So, as I mentioned before, I have a slight obsession with super tape.  Well, this project was no different.  I figured if I was going to spend all this time cutting these little cupcakes out, I didn't want them destroyed in a matter of minutes!  On, to the 'laminating'!

2 'Laminated' sheets ready for cutting!

In the same way as before I sandwich the cut-outs between strips of tape, once you get the hang of it, it goes pretty quickly.  Each set of printables has pieces to put together 8 complete cupcakes: 8 cakes, 8 papers, 10 frosting choices, and 10 decorations. So cute! I stumbled upon a fabulous discovery while putting these cupcake kits together-ready? It's big......super tape covered paper and a fine mist of plain old water on a window creates instant window clingies!!! Woo-HOoo!  My kids LOVE window clingies.  The only problem is that since they are gel like when they fall to the floor they pick up all sorts of nasty, and then they end up getting tossed.  Well, these little wonders easily stick with a single spray of plain old water, stay up for a long time, and when they do fall off, all you have to do is wipe them off!  I have to admit, I felt pretty amazing when I figured this out.  My littles played with their cupcakes on the window for a while and then on the table for a while longer.  It was fabulous and definitely worth the time it took to cut them out.  And best of all, they are safely put in a baggie for the next time they want to play!

Instant window clings!

Makin cupcakes!  :-)

  Here's the link again for the free printable: 'build-your-own-cupcake'

Reusable shopping bags into fun library book bags!

Last week we finally took the munchkins to the local library and signed them up for their very own library cards.  Who would have thought that such a simple thing could bring so much excitement.  You'd think we had given them a freebie pass to Disneyland!  They rushed into the kids area and began collecting books with me trailing behind.  Seeing as the library has no limit to the number of books they are allowed to check out, they were determined to get as many as their little hearts desired.  I had visions of armloads of books being dropped into puddles, misplaced or ruined books and library fees coming in the mail on a weekly basis.  I quickly realized limits must be enforced.  My first offer was 5 books each, but I'm pretty sure by the time the words left my mouth I was already holding more than 10 books.  I stuck to my guns with the 10 book each limit however.  Even then , 20 books is a lot to carry!  The library recycles grocery sacks to carry your treasures out the door, but seriously?-a flimsy plastic grocery sack?!  No, not a good long term solution. 

Of course, my thoughts began to wander and as we were later walking through the grocery store it settled...right on the rack of reusable grocery bags.  Perfect! Nice and big, square bottom, and the best part: less than $1 each!  (of course I have multitudes of these bags in various places in our home already-but these needed to match, and not have dried who knows what already spilled on/in them!)  I told the kids at the store what they would be used for and once again, they were very excited-new books and a new bag!! All in one day-best.day.ever!  Now these nondescript plain old bags would have worked just fine.  I could have just tied a colored ribbon to each one to identify which bag belonged to which munchkin.  But, no-that's not how this Momma rolls.  If I'm going to do something I may as well do it right...or at least do it crafty.  A few days passed and my thoughts on how to customize these bags 
culminated.  I wanted to make them easily identifiable and cute-of course!  And seeing as the kids' library cards were going to become just one more thing for me to try to keep track of and would most likely be misplaced or lost in the bottom of the diaper bag, I wanted a special pocket to keep them.  I sketched out a general idea for each of them:  A dino for the Cub, and a lady bug for the Bug.  I realized as I began that I would be covering both sides of the bag, not just one-way to make the task twice as long....oh well. 

So, over the past few years felt has become my craft medium of choice.  Its so versatile and colorful, and to be honest-cheap!  I dug out my various boxes of random felt pieces and began piecing my bag-patched together.  As I snipped and figured out the layout, the kids had a blast taking all the scraps and making little 'pictures' out of them, I had to be watchful or they would snag the pieces i was actually needing!  I decided that if I was making a bag to carry stories, maybe the bag should tall a story too!  For Bug's lady bug, the front has the little lady on a leaf, on the back, no bug, and a bite out of the leaf!  (not sure if lady bugs eat leaves or not, but whatever!)

  Cub's dino was the design I had come up with first actually.  The front has the volcano, and the dino, the back has no dino and smoke coming out of the volcano...hee hee, kind of cute I think!  I had to get the designs approved by the little first, and they had all kinds of suggestions-like a frog onn the dino's back and some birds, and more flowers, etc.  I get veto power though-so there! ha!

  Putting it all together went pretty quickly actually, felt is so easy to work with!  Once The main background was sewn I had to figure out how to make the dino and ladybug the card pockets.  The easiest way I found was to lay the actual card on the shape and sew around it.  I wanted it to be a tight fit, but still a fit!  It worked pretty well.  :-)  Probably the most difficult part of the entire project was sewing the patches onto the bags.  Trying to keep them straight and not lumpy proved to be a little interesting when the bulk of the bag was all scrunched up in the machine.
 
When all was said and done however, I have to say I am pretty happy with the results.  The cards fit well, the bags are easily identified and the kids love them!  Happy Day!

The fronts.  Bug's card is tucked away under the ladybug's wings, Cub's card is behind the dino's back! Yay!

The backs.  :-)

Happy kids with a bag full-o-books!  

  Now we have happy munchkins with custom book bags, and a happy Momma who won't have to worry about losing library cards!  And since they like their bags so much the books stay in them any time they aren't being read-woo hoo!!  I see many trips to the library in our future.