January 7, 2020
Uncategorized
Seeing a row of clear jars filled with colored sand gives me all the feels. The rainbow joy, the craft potential, and the throwback memories to when I used to layer colored sand in little glass bottles.If you want to give sand art a more 2020 vibe, try this fun project that I made for my friends at Oriental Trading. Head over to Fun 365 to add the project to cart and purchase everything that you need to make these!
The sand assortment that I used comes with enough sand for oodles of projects (twelve 22-ounce jars!); this would be a great activity for a play date or birthday party! Make sure to cover your work surface or use a tray, or your table will look like a colorful sandy beach!
Here’s what you need:
Here’s how you do it:
1. Cut white cardstock down to the size you want your cards to be. We made 5″ by 7″ and 6″-square cards.
2. Stick foam letters or shapes onto the cardstock. Remember that you are going to eventually peel these off, so tape them down with medium pressure.
3. With a paint brush or foam brush, spread Mod Podge® around the stickers. Try not to let the Mod Podge® pool around the sticker edges, as that will create clumps of sand that might accidentally get pulled off. You want to paint a light coat, but enough so that your sand will stick into it.
4. Using a spoon, generously sprinkle the sand color of your choice over the wet Mod Podge®. This set comes with a dozen colors so the possibilities are endless!
5. Press sand down with your hand or the back of the spoon. This helps the sand stick to the glue. Then dump, shake, or tap the sand off the card and let it dry.
6. Pull the stickers off carefully and slowly.
7. Hang up your new sand art notecards or write on them and give them to friends!
December 20, 2019
Christmas, Early Elementary, Everyday Crafts, Family Bonding, Gifts, Grown-Up, Older Elementary, Playrooms, Tween to Teen, Yarn & Fabric
We had a backgammon set growing up in the 80s. It was brown pleather with tan and white triangular spaces. I loved everything about that set…I loved the snap of the clasps, the smell of the felt interior, and the smooth perfection of the playing pieces. Mind you I never played the game (I didn’t know how), but I loved to carry the set around like a briefcase holding important papers.
I finally learned to play the game during my senior year in college and gradually all of my roommates and close friends learned to play as well. We took our board everywhere…to the quad, to bars, on spring break, and to this day we still play when we’re together.
But now I’ve passed the love of the game onto my daughter Sommer. At only 7, she doesn’t have the most strategic moves and whenever I roll doubles, she declares that she’s going to lose. Whenever she sees a board at a friend’s house or restaurant, she insists on playing. And I’m always down.
I’ve seen lots of gorgeous backgammon boards, and I’ve always thought it would be the easiest of the classic games to make. Since the board itself is a lightweight bag, this DIY version is a perfect travel set. Your pieces can be virtually anything, but as I was crafting I wondered why I had never seen pieces that weren’t solid-colored circles. I thought about making ombre pieces, or patterned pieces, but then I settled on these charming, smirkish faces. And why Shrinky Dinks®? Basically because I am obsessed with them!
This is a great project to make as a gift or for yourself before a trip of any sort. Once the playing pieces are shrunk, they have a slightly rough texture which grips nicely to the felt board so no sliding.
What you’ll need:
Have fun and here’s to a lifetime of double 6’s!
December 19, 2019
ad, Christmas, Decor, Early Elementary, Family Bonding, Grown-Up, Holidays, Older Elementary, Tween to Teen, Uncategorized, Yarn & Fabric
This post was sponsored by P-touch Embellish ELITE.
Making Christmas ornaments is one of my favorite craft pastimes…they are like little artful sculptures, each one with its own personality. Snowmen, angels, elves…when you make these tiny little characters, you have so much opportunity to add little details that make them super special. And that’s why I was so excited when my friends at Brother asked me to use the new P-touch Embellish Elite to make a holiday craft for my blog this year.
When you hear P-touch you may automatically think of just a label. But the P-touch Embellish ELITE is SO not just a label maker…it’s a memory-maker, a craft-maker, and a gift-maker! First it prints on ribbon (from ~1/2″ to ~1″ wide) which is super-innovative. Next, you control it from your mobile device using the free P-touch Design&Print App, so you don’t have to type on a tiny buttoned keyboard. And lastly, you connect via Bluetooth® so it’s super slick, easy, and compact.
Have fun playing with all of the different ribbon and tape colors and printable patterns, fonts, and symbols that the P-touch Embellish ELITE has to offer. Definitely make this project a family affair…while you’re printing ribbon, your kids can be cutting felt or painting. And together you can bring some little elves to life to live on your Christmas tree this year!
What you need:
Make It:
This post was sponsored by P-touch Embellish ELITE.
November 28, 2019
Christmas, Early Elementary, Everyday Crafts, Gifts, Grown-Up, Older Elementary, Tween to Teen, Uncategorized, Winter
I have loved stickers for as long as I can remember. As kids of the 80s, I, along with all my friends, carried my sticker binder to and from school, and at any free moment, we would sit in little clusters, trading scratch-n-sniffs for oilies (you know, the ones that had the oily liquid inside?). Some people would organize their collections by color, some by type, some by theme…mine were more chronological; I just liked to organize them in neat rows so my eyes could clearly scan the goods.
When my friends at Pipsticks, a super sticker subscription club that delivers a packet of stickers to your mailbox monthly, asked me if I wanted to collaborate on a winter sticker design, I nearly died. I went to town thinking of all of the ways I could combine my love of crafting with stickers to create a sticker sheet that gave sticker-lovers some creativity to create a design that felt uniquely theirs.
I went through my craft portfolio and thought about what people love to craft in the winter months…and snow globes came to mind. Some people like nature snow globes, some want skaters, and some go for animals and log cabins. With this sticker sheet, you can create the ideal DIY snow globe of your dreams—no hot-glue gun or fake snow required!
To get the Project Kid Snow Globe sticker sheet, subscribe by November 30, 2019…and, because you are a friend of ours, enter PROJECTKID15 at checkout for 15% off your first month! For all the sticker lovers in your life, this is a gift that keeps on giving!
November 26, 2019
Animals, Baby, Early Elementary, Fall, Family Bonding, Grown-Up, Older Elementary, Paper, Preschool, Thanksgiving, Toddler, Tween to Teen
It’s probably been at least 35 years since I’ve made a paper handprint turkey. And to be honest, in the nine years that I’ve been a mom, I don’t think either of my kids have ever brought home a handprint turkey. I’ve never been disappointed by that, mostly because I don’t totally love them.
But this year I decided that it would be fun to make a handprint turkey, using the hands of all four of our hands…my husband Michael, me, Oliver, and Sommer. I love the idea that it was a combo of all of our hands, so I wanted to figure out how to show the blending together of us. Instead of using construction paper, I used colored vellum.
These family handprint turkeys looks so pretty hanging in the window so the light can pass through them. If you want to make your own, check out the instructions below!
Materials:
Make it: