Daydreams and Passports

I am definitely looking forward to summer break.  Not that I don't love my job, but one of the *perks* of working in schools is getting my summers off to spend on things *I* want to do!  Like crafting, writing more, catching up on a million and one projects, reorganizing the home, etc.  One of the top things on our to-do list this summer is travel.  Of course, with no savings to speak of, travel has to be modified.  Thankfully, we live in Indiana, where clearly residents always wished to get out and see the world even though they were always poor farmers and couldn't travel.  How do I know this?  Look at some of our city names:

Peru
Morocco
Mexico
Lebanon
Brazil
Ireland
Scotland
Warsaw
Versailles
Manila
Mecca
Paris
Rome

Clearly the "crossroads of America" really means this is where you have to pass through to get to the good stuff.  ;)  Just kidding.  I'm actually a little in love with the idea that I could actually afford to visit all of these places in a matter of weekends and we could talk like posh people who've seen the world.

SO.  Paul and I have decided that this summer we are going to do a "staycation" of sorts and travel to each of these cities, a few at a time.  We will stamp our own fun little fake passports, and do one fun thing in each city to remember it by (if you know of anything in any of these small towns, let me know! I've gotta start researching NOW).  We'll also take a picture by the city sign as proof of our adventures and compile it all into a scrapbook.  Sounds like fun, right?  :)

If you're in Indiana this summer and you want to join in the fun, let me know! 

If you aren't, but want a fun fake passport to download and modify with relatively little hassle, there is a cute one HERE. 

You can use it for your own travels around your state, or for homeschooling purposes (read about different cultures and stamp as you go), or "Around the World in 80 Days" youth/YSA activities, or whatever your heart desires.  :)  They even have some stamps included (to print off and tape, of course) and all you have to do it print, cut, laminate (optional), and write in the details.  I love not having to reinvent the wheel!  And I can't wait for our summer staycation to begin!  Daydreaming about it is really what's keeping me going through the sometimes LONG work days.  :)

Cereal Box Mosaics :)

I have been saving and cutting up my cereal boxes into little 1/2" squares and sorting them by color into old jars for the last few months JUST so I could try this project out.

I thought my niece would love it, but it turns out you have to have a little more patience and artistic vision than a 7-year-old girl with no sleep really had.  She just wanted to doodle more than glue and put all the pieces together.  :)  But it gave me a chance to try it out on a smaller scale, and now I know that I want to do a much larger version soon!

Gather cardstock, some plain ol' school glue, and a paintbrush (to brush the paint more evenly across your paper, totally optional), and of course a pencil and your mosaic tiles.  :)

1) Just cut a piece of cardstock to the size you want. I recommend a 5x7 for the kiddos, anything bigger is very time-consuming.  Plus you can frame it this way.  :)
2) Draw a decently large image of what you want to make...mine was a moon, Caida's was a castle.  You want to make sure you don't have too many details, larger shapes are better since each mosaic tile is 1/2" square!
3) Paint a layer of glue over the top inch or two.
4) Start laying down your tiles.  Go piece by piece, row by row, and just put the color that MOST belongs there to make your shapes.  Of course the image will be pixelated--the smaller your image/artwork, the MORE pixelated it will be.  And the cereal box pieces are almost NEVER a single color, but that's okay.  That adds to the artsy aspect of the whole thing.  It will still be awesome, I promise.  :)
5) Cover the whole page with tiles as best you can and let dry.  Image will be stiff.

Here's my moon, with blue/purple/black sky:

And here's Caida's unfinished castle...at least you can tell she had a colorful castle, blue sky, and green grass.  :)  She just didn't have the patience to finish.

I think I'm going to add mosaic to my trio hot air balloon art vision I have for my guest bedroom.  More posts on that to follow.  ;)

Double the Bubble Fun!

When Caida (my 7-year-old niece) came to hang out and spend the night with us last weekend, we wanted to make sure we actually did something FUN.  Usually she just gets on the computer, phone, or Wii--which are all fun for HER, and they DO allow me to still get things done around the house on a Saturday night, but it's not exactly the kind of thing that is going to make happy memories for her.  Especially now that she doesn't just live a 2-minute-drive down the street like she used to...

So I decided the theme of the evening would be bubbles.  Caida LOVES bubbles.  She will do just about anything for them.  So, Pinterest to the rescue, we first made our own bubble wands.  Not only is this a fun and cheap and quick kid craft, but I got to be a teacher and quiz her on patterns.  I let her do a couple of fun ones, too, of course...but we made patterned ones for her "brothers and sister" (the kids she lives with now).  She loved making so many to share!

Concentrating so hard!

The final collection.

Then I thought the glow-in-the-dark bubbles would be a lot of fun.  She would get to stay up late and we could enjoy the night within the safety of our patio.  All you do is break open a couple of glow sticks and pour in the glowy goodness into your bubble solution.  I discovered a few things about this that were a little disappointing...like they don't actually make BUBBLES when you do that (I had to add like 1/4 c. of dish soap to make it bubbly again), and then when you add the dish soap the glow-in-the-dark coolness of the whole thing looks really murky and loses its glow really fast.  Not to mention the bubbles themselves did not glow at all.  So it was a cool idea, but a little disappointing. Caida, in one of her most grown-up moments yet, said, "We did all that work for NOTHING?"  But she still had fun blowing bubbles at the couples walking by for an evening stroll.  :)  And it LOOKED awesome at first. :)  We made a nice mess on our porch with it all.

The next morning after Church we went to our apartment's sweet playground for a while.  It may not look like much, but those slides are kinda tall and there's one in the back, too.  And it's all VERY sturdy...even I could go on it. 

Okay, out of order, but the night before as we waited for it to get dark enough to try our experiment we made our own French bread pizzas for dinner.  Here's what Caida made with the extra plate:

And she REALLY wanted to take a picture of her first round nighttime meds. :)

It was a fun mini-weekend!  I'm trying to figure out what to do next time!

Quick Lil' Campfire

Is your little corner of the world on a fire ban like us?  Do you have a camp-in date night planned, or just want a safe faux campfire for your littles to play with?  Are you a teacher and want a "campfire" for your morning meetings or writers to share their stories around?  Here is a QUICK lil' campfire you can whip up in half an hour or less, and best of all it's almost FREE!

YOU WILL NEED:

Wrapping paper, paper towel tubes (or toilet paper tubes): 5 or 6 lengths that are half the width of the fire you want to make and several (6 or 7) smaller-cut circles.

Paper (a few shades of yellow and a light orange work best) that is crumpled and gathered at the center of each piece, hot glue gun/gluesticks, scissors (optional)

STEP ONE: Glue the sides of your long tubes together at one end and fan out so that they look like spokes--it's more sturdy if you also glue a smaller circle in the middle of it.

STEP TWO: Glue the small circles in between each long tube at the center.  This not only gives it a little more sturdiness but also will come in handy for step 3.  :)

STEP THREE: Put a little hot glue in the inside of one of the small circle tubes and push the crumpled, gathered corner of a yellow paper inside of it.  Continue around, alternating shades of yellow.  In the center hole, stick at least three crumpled pieces of paper in it to make it a nice, full flame.

STEP FOUR: Cut out 3-4 orange flame shapes (you'll want them to be a little bigger than the rest of the fire, for a pleasing visual dimension) and stick them in between the yellow paper flames.  Depending on your purpose, you can glue them in or not.  (In this sharing time activity, I had stories/honesty case studies written on each orange flame that they could pick out to read, so they were removable.  If I were making this for a child's plaything, I'd glue them in for sure.  In my classroom, I might have review questions, songs, morning meeting prompts, writer/reader response questions, etc. on the flames and have them removeable.)

STEP FIVE: Gather around your lil' campfire and tell stories, sing songs, and share good conversation!

Sharing pioneer stories around the campfire with our senior primary :)
Got the idea and the stories/case studies HERE.

I love this lil' campfire TONS and I can't wait to use it in my someday-classroom as well!  :)  Happy camping!

Faux Bubblegum Machine...with a purpose!

Remember this awesome faux gumball machine my BFF Linds made me?

(A tutorial can be found HERE)

Well, after we ate all that sugary candy fruit, we filled it with 7 pounds of M&Ms. 

(1/2 gone...)

And then ate it ALL.

In a week.

And then it sat for a few months, empty.  The problem with this is that I wanted to either (A) fill it with candy and eat, fill and eat, rinse and repeat, which would NOT help me lose weight, or (B) fill it with gumballs--which I don't even like, honestly.  So candy sitting for months in the "machine" didn't bode well with me, either.  And keeping it empty did no good and was a waste of a perfectly beautiful birthday gift.

Well, I FINALLY got inspired.  That's the first time in a WHILE, craft-wise, so as soon as I thought through the details I went right to WalMart and bought 4 dozen ping pong balls and a Sharpie.

Oh, the magic that happens with a Sharpie!  :)

So, I give you...my faux bubblegum machine centerpiece/conversation starter!

(Yeah, I should probably come up with a shorter name for it.)

ANYWAY, I just took those ping pong balls, and painted them in six different colors.  Conveniently, the ping pong balls fit right into my plastic painting palette, so I could easily paint and dry them one half at a time.

Then I used the Sharpie to write a different question on each one.  They actually normally sell colorful ping pong balls already, but WalMart was out of them and I was impatient...not to mention I already had the paint and the white ones were WAY cheaper.  48 questions, none too nostalgic so even kids can play along, to get conversation going around the dinner table. 

If you're needing ideas, here are my 48 questions:

1.       What’s the verb you want to spend your life with?

2.       If you could have any superpower, what would it be and why?

3.       What would you do with a million dollars?

4.       If your life had a soundtrack, what are some of the songs that would be on it?

5.       If you could vacation anywhere in the world for one month, where would you go?

6.       Five of your favorite things?

7.       If you could have picked your own name, what would it be?

8.       What is the funniest joke you know?

9.       What would you do today if you knew you were going to die tomorrow?

10.   What fictitious character is most like you?

11.   What thought would you like to put in a million fortune cookies?

12.   If your life had a remote control, which button would you press most often?

13.   What do you (secretly) wish you knew how to do better?

14.   If you could take in any 3 animals as pets, what would they be?

15.   What is your biggest “claim to fame?”

16.   If you could win a shopping spree to any store, which would you choose?

17.   What do you want to be when you grow up?

18.   Do you (or have you ever) collected anything?

19.   If you were a punctuation mark, which would you be and why?

20.   What are some of your biggest fears?

21.   Which TV family would you most like to belong to?

22.   What would you like your famous last words to be?

23.   What is the most common compliment people give you?

24.   If you could swim in a pool of any food or drink item, what would you choose?

25.   Finish this sentence: “Love is…”

26.   Do you have any scars?  How did you get them?

27.   What was the best day you’ve ever had?

28.   If you hosted a dinner party for 5 guests (anyone goes), who would you invite?

29.   Would you rather live under the ocean or on the moon?

30.   If you had three wishes, what would they be?

31.   What one work of fiction do you wish was true?

32.   Which friend (besides family) have you had the longest?

33.   Who in your family are you closest to?

34.   If you could only eat one thing for the rest of your life, what would you pick?

35.   Where do you see yourself 20 years from now?

36.   If they made a movie of your life, what genre would it be?  Who would play you?

37.   Who is/was your favorite pet?

38.   What is a favorite family tradition of yours?

39.   What is one thing you learned today?

40.   What do you think is the greatest invention of all time?

41.   Would you rather be blind or deaf?

42.   What is your biggest pet peeve?

43.   If you were President for a week, what 3 laws would you create?

44.   What is your favorite room in the house?

45.   If you were in a yearbook now, you would be voted “Most Likely To ______”

46.   What sport do you enjoy playing/watching the most?

47.   What item would you put in a time capsule for someone to find 100 years from now?

48.   What about your life (to date) are you most proud of?

You could modify this in a ton of ways, of course, which makes it even more fun.

AT HOME:

• This could be your "boredom buster" jar.
• You could write Sunday-appropriate activities on each ball and that could be your go-to place on the Sabbath.
• You could write a different chore on each one and have the kiddos pick different jobs to do.

AT SCHOOL:

• use these prompts as morning meeting starters
• creative writing/journal prompts
• reading response tasks
• alternative assessment ideas listed on each one...like instead of a book report, do this...
• "early finisher" tasks
• alternative to the popsicle stick names/jars
• use as a "prize box," with a different incentive/reward written on each one

The possibilities really are endless!  I'm so happy that I have found a use for this adorable faux gumball machine that won't interfere with my weight loss goals.  It is a TRUE CONVERSATION PIECE, and I am happy with the final result.  :)  I'm also happy to finally have something to show off, since I haven't had much of that lately.  Here's to good things to come!

 

Some free LDS downloads, made by yours truly!

Made with love.  :)

I've been having a TON of fun working on some stuff for Primary (or just for myself, as I've been inspired to do).  Feel free to download any of these things--for personal or church use only, not for profit.  :)  All links are directly below the images.

CTR BOOKMARKS
These are intended to be printed off as a 4"x6" prints, then cut down the middle to make two 2"x6" bookmarks.  Laminated is best, of course, but not necessary.  All bookmarks made from free-for-personal-use kits from various designers in the LDS Blog Train Blog from January (themed, appropriately, Choose the Right!).  We're distributing these as we visit children in their homes this year--great as a gift, incentive, or just for keeping your place in scripture study!

Download Link

Download Link

Download Link

Download Link

Download Link

PRIMARY SONG SUBWAY ART
This is my first attempt at Subway art...it was a lot of fun to make, and I didn't even venture into my hundreds of fun fonts!  Be on the lookout for more of these in the future for sure.  There's an 8x10 print link and a 5x7 print link, so be sure to click on the right one!

8"x10" download link

5"x7" download link

LDS PRIMARY POSTCARDS
We want to send a spiritually-themed postcard to kids that are sick and missing primary each week, but looking around online, I hadn't really found anything...don't get me wrong, there's lots of CUTE stuff out there about missing the kids, but we wanted basically a nice LDS picture with a short quote or scripture on it so that if they were to keep it and put it up in their room or on the fridge, it would remind them of the Savior and of the temple.  The pictures are either from the LDS.org image site (which allows you to copy for home or church use) or from an awesome blogger who offers LDS artwork for free for personal use.  So here are a few postcards to print--just print on cardstock, write your message on the back, and send out!  :)  (I love that you can send almost ANYTHING through the mail.)

First Vision 4x6 Postcard link

Jesus Loved the Little Children postcard link

I Love to See the Temple Postcard

Caida's Church Binder!

I have been wanting to make something to entertain Caida at Church since FOREVER, and with subbing being slow this week I finally got my chance!  It's not really anything special, but I am in LOVE with it, anyway...and want to make one for ME now, too!

Here's a quick tour:

The binder cover, all pink, of course.  :)  The swoopy font is called "Before the Rain" and the open font below it is called "{skinny} jeans"...I just colored it in with a sharpie.

Inside is, of course, all pink, too!  A pink pencil pouch filled with a few pencils, twistable crayons and colored pencils (she's one of the cool kids now :), and dry erase markers.  Behind it, a pink folder filled with...

Coloring pages!  Random abstract designs are on the left (more for when I color with her), and things from the Friend are on the right.  P.S. Almost EVERYTHING I have is from the Friend online, or old copies of the Friend or Ensign we'd saved.  I love it!  I wish Caida were a *little* older, or a slightly better reader...but I still found plenty of age-appropriate games she could do independently, so I'm happy.

Then, behind it, there are these tabbed page dividers.  I found activities and stories I thought she could enjoy on her own and laminated them...I'm a crazy person and color-coordinated everything.  You certainly don't have to!  Laminating is awesome, though, because she can do those activities again and again with those dry erase markers I got her.

The purple section is for mazes...all with a church-related theme, of course.

The blue section is for word searches.

The green section is for hidden pictures.  Since she's not a super-strong reader, I made two copies of the hidden pictures and cut out everything she was supposed to find from one, placing them around the picture with a label so she can learn the words and see what she's got to find.  I am super happy with how these came out...and *I* got to play a little as I found everything and put it together, too!

The yellow section is for miscellaneous activities...like matching games, drawing, connect-the-dots, and so on.

And the pink section is for stories and pictures.
I loved these picture stories when I was a wee tot!

I wanted Caida to have her own pictures of things that are important to our faith, as she is preparing to be baptized this year!  It's also great to have stuff like that around to keep sacrament more reverent.  She loves my gospel art book, but she's always asking me "What's this? What's that?"  Not so reverent.  So I found pictures of all the most important stuff (that I didn't think she knew much about) from old issues of church magazines, stuck on a traceable title for each page (it was in a font literally called "trace"...which will be great for those dry-erase markers!), and wrote a sentence or two about the topic that she could (mostly) read all by herself.

Here are the "Plan of Salvation" and "Joseph Smith" pages.

Here are the "scriptures" and "baptism" pages.

You get the idea.  :)  Like I said, it's nothing fancy, but I think it'll help her stay entertained in a more reverent way during sacrament meeting as she learns more about the gospel of Jesus Christ...and if I just *have* to help her, it'll be fun for me, too!  And laminating everything means I don't have to keep running out to make copies of everything...except the coloring pages.  If you want, you could laminate those, too, and give the kids dry erase crayons...but Caida doesn't like the texture of coloring that way.  I can't wait to add to this binder as the she grows up.  And if we get to start doing FHE with her, I now have some great resources to get started!

Happy crafting!