Activity Monday - Christmas Craft

Today we started doing Christmas Craft. Mini Miss is already very excited about Christmas. She is no longer scared of Santa, but keen to see him, get a lolly & have a cuddle (yes, the stranger danger thing bothers me). She understands that there will be a tree and presents and celebrations. 

She also understands that Christmas is a celebration of Jesus birthday. 

So while I was setting up today's activity, she had a great time colouring in a picture of Jospeh, Mary and Baby Jesus. While doing this she informed me that "I love baby Jesus". Makes my heart swell with love. 

Normally I don't buy ready made craft activities. I find they are too directive and can stifle creativity. Also, if a child has a "perfect" example, even just a picture, of what is expected to be achieved but they cannot achieve it, it sets them up to fail. My children will learn about failures, I'm not going to set them up for it.

But this activity was different. And seriously, CHEAP!!! So I thought as an easy, no fuss, first Christmas craft activity it would be great. 

$3 from Officeworks, was this set of 6 Christmas figures that you make out of plaster of Paris & then paint them. Everything is supplied in the package, dried plaster, moulds, paints and a paint brush.

(NOTE: it did say to use with children over 5yrs & no Mini Miss is not 5, but with ample adult supervision she was fine).

I set about reading the instructions while Mini Miss coloured. Immediately I noticed there were no measurements. "Add plaster to water and stir until a thick pourable paste is made". No idea how much water to use, I had to guess. I also wasn't going to risk using too much, so I put the plaster in first then slowly added water while stirring the whole time. It took somewhere between 1/2-3/4 cup of water to reach a consistency I was happy with. Mini Miss did some of the stirring while I poured water. Stirring is one of her favourite things to do in the kitchen! 

Once mixed, we poured it into our moulds. 

Explaining to a 2.5yr that she has to now wait for a couple hours while they dried was not going to go well, so I had more activities planned, boring housework, but she loves to help! 

After 2 hours they popped out easily & didn't look too bad!

Now the fun, painting. Mini Miss needed some encouragement to paint them, it wasn't until later I realised she thought they were food as we had "cooked" them in the kitchen! No wonder she didn't want to paint them, I'm constantly telling her not to eat the paint! Eventually she got into it though! 

We were also lucky to have a fair bit of plaster left over, so I put it to good use.

No idea yet what we will use it for, but it's cute! And underneath I will name & date it.

The trick to using pre made activities is to  let go. Let your child just use their imagination, let them paint what they want, how they want. This is the hardest thing for me. I see that picture perfect example and want to achieve that, but I'm now focusing more on what Mini Miss gets out of it, rather than the final product. 

For example, from this activity, here are some of the skills she gets out of it; 

• Hand eye coordination, 
• Colour identification, 
• Colouring mixing, 
• Talk about Christmas and an ever growing vocabulary. 
• Learning the value of patience was a good one today too! 

So the final product? Not "perfect", but she is happy and so am I! 

Now I am off to explore Pinterest and find some more Christmas activities! 

Activity Monday - Paint

Today I decided on some messy play. Something simple but so much fun! 

We made our own paint!!

It's a very simple recipe

• 1 cup flour
• 1 cup salt
• 1 cup of water
• Food colouring of your choice. 

I gathered the ingredients we would need with Mini Miss. She loves being involved in EVERYTHING at the moment, so I pulled it out of the cupboard, she put it on the bench. Then she went straight to the Tupperware cupboard to get our "special mixing bowl". It's just a silver bowl, but I always use it for mixing craft stuff in, so she just KNEW!! 

As Mini Miss is now 2.5, I decided she should do the making, with supervision of course! 

I find it VERY hard to ignore the mess, but this activity isn't about me, it's about her and I don't want to fill her head with my weirdness, so I reign it in as much as possible! Also, she is like her Mum, messy in the kitchen! (I drive myself crazy with cleaning up as I go when I cook. I am a major mess in the kitchen, but apparently my creations always turn out ok, so I guess it's a good thing!) 

I talked her through each step, explaining things like she needed to fill the cup right to the top, what she needed next etc. this is a VERY basic recipe, so it wasn't hard, and pouring, scooping, measuring and stiring are perfect skills for her to be learning. 

In fact, all I really did was add the food colouring and finished off the stiring to get out most of the lumps. 

So basically, you put all the ingredients in a bowl, add a few drops of colour and stir. I added extra water to this recipe as I was putting it in sauce bottles and I needed it a little runnier to make it easier to use. The consistency to aim for I think is runny pancake batter. (Everyone knows what a good pancake batter looks like!!).

I then poured it carefully into seperate sauce containers. We ended up with 4 colours. 

Of course, Mini Miss insisted in being involved in the clean up, and seriously, what Mum is going to say no to that?!! (And if you would, then I say don't! Encourage their involvement in all steps, including clean up! Believe me, all too soon they are teens who dont do anything with being dragged by the collar! Yes, it takes longer, sometimes it creates more mess, but it's teaching them to clean up after themselves.) So I gave her a sponge and let her wipe down the bench while I did a quick wash up.

REMEMBER!! 

This is a messy activity! They will spill flour, splash water, miss the cup, and if your toddler is like mine, eat some of the ingredients as you go! (Her face when she tasted it was priceless! Like she just sucked on a lemon! But she kept eating it!). 

The good thing with making things like paint at home is you know what's in them, and despite the taste, it won't make your little one sick. 

So yes, in hindsight, I SHOULD HAVE put a towel on the chair she was standing on! Good tip that! If they are standing on a fabric chair, COVER IT!! 

Another good tip if you are letting your toddler do this is have separate "craft" flour/salt/other ingredients. They put their hands in the containers and packets, they lick their fingers and dive back on in! So, keep the food ingredients separate from your craft ingredients!! 

After lunch we headed outside where I had set up a special painting activity, painting with her new paints on black card. We nearly ALWAYS paint in white paper, so I thought she would enjoy this difference. She sure did! Lots of talk followed as she painted about the night sky and "outta space". Lots of describing what she was creating with her new paints, it was great! 

And her final products? 

The first one was "night time" and the second one was "space". 

Today's activity was great, it was messy, sensory and gave us lots of opportunity for talking about lots of different things (textures, colours, measuring, space, night time....).

Best of all? 

It was FUN!

Activity Monday - bubbles, my bubbles!!!

Monday was a public holiday this week. Which is awesome. It meant everyone was home on a week day for a change. 

It also meant I was not prepared for Activity Monday. Again. 

"oh well" I said, "I will just move Activity Monday to Thursday this week"

"No, don't mess with the routine" said Muddled Hubby
"No, I want do some activity" said Mini Miss

So it was fly by the seat of my pants Activity Monday. Again.

After a quick peruse of my favourite site Pinterest (<---- you can follow my boards there if you want to :0) I decided on doing Bubble Painting.

I found a great link HERE about bubble painting that inspired me. I also used my own experience as a daycare teacher and student teacher, from MANY MANY moons ago! 

I set about gathering supplies. The good thing about "Fly by the seat of your pants Activity Monday" is that if you want to do it too, you should already have everything you need in your cupboard!

Basically, for those who are not visual, here is a list!

• Dishwashing Liquid
• Food colouring and a little paint (not pictured, oops!)
• Water (no excuses here, we are on tank water and we had some!!)
• Straws
• some containers (Im sure you have a hideous Tupperware cupboard like me, don't you? Please say you do!)

Firstly I put a good squirt of dishwashing liquid in each container (i had 3, one for each colour) then topped them up with water. Then I added a good splash of colour to each container. Then about a tablespoon or so of paint and mixed.

That's it. Easy!

Then let the kids go for it! 

They blow lots and lots of bubbles, just like this

Then put your paper over the top and Voila! A beautiful, swirly marbley bubbly painting! 

A couple of rules I highly recommend:  

1. Its important that they understand to BLOW and not SUCK the liquid. I used the water and NON TOXIC paint as inevitably, despite knowing this, Mini Miss was bound to suck, which she did, once. It tasted awful, obviously, and she didn't do it again!
2. In my opinion, this is obvious, but play outside! This is going to get messy! Unless you have ample drop sheets and want to do loads of clean up, keep it outside! 
3. Food dye can stain. Clothes on a hot day, like it was on Monday, are optional! If you do need clothes, make them old ones or wear a paint shirt over the top, just in case! Most food dyes come out, but I don't need an angry rant from that one Mum who decided their brand new $60 Pumpkin Patch outfit was perfect for this activity! OLD CLOTHES people!

Mini Miss was having so much fun even Miss Teen decided to join in, sort of! She blew bubbles, but wasn't so much interested in the painting side of things! 

When we were done with the bubble painting, which was about the time Mini Miss decided that blowing bubbles wasn't fun enough anymore, and she was wanted to paint with her hands, feet, hair....you get the idea, we cleaned up! 

I quickly whisked away the bowls, and gave Mini Miss a bowl with just water and a bit of soap

.

Then let her play in the wading pool. She had so much fun with that, that I decided to fill up a second bucket with warm soapy water to see what she would do. 

A lot of fun was had!

But the fun thing about Activity Monday is that you never know where it will lead.The planned activity usually leads on to another and another. Part of that is because I love to let Mini Miss lead the experiences, and also because I can see an extension opportunity....and there was so much more fun to be had.....