Kids Activities

Making a Crafty Mr. Potato Head for St. Patrick’s Day

February 28, 2017 by Eileen 14 Comments

My little guy loves craft time with his mama.

But, I might love it just a little more.

I love watching his creativity, his little mind at work, as he comes up with new ways of doing things.

We have a sweet little set-up in my office, where he has a craft table beside my desk. On his table, he has a bin of art supplies that he’s allowed to use whenever (crayons, markers, and paper).

He also has a drawer in my desk with supplies that he can use with permission (glue, scissors, etc).

In addition to crafts, my little guy loves putting things together – doing puzzles, making pictures with foam shapes, and most especially, accessorizing Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head.

So, when my sister suggested making a real Mr. Potato Head craft as a St. Patrick’s Day activity, I knew he would love it!

Collecting Materials

This was a no cost project – other than two potatoes, which we usually have. The night before, my son and I collected things from around the craft room to use, so we would be all ready to go after breakfast the following day.

We found felt, foam, pipe cleaners, pom-poms, stickers, shamrocks, card stock, cotton balls, ribbon, and glue. However, you can really use whatever you find or have.

My son loved collecting all of things for our Mr. Potato Head craft. His special job was to put everything I handed him in the bin. He loves his special jobs 🙂

He loved putting everything together the day before because it gave him something to look forward to.

He loves getting into all of my craft supplies, so his eyes were lighting up at all of the fun things he was going to get to use.

Pictured below is the set-up. Whenever we have a messy project or a food project, I lay down a plastic table cloth, which makes for easy cleanup with a toddler.

Decorating the Mr. Potato Head Craft

Then, we just had fun and got creative. My son told us what we needed – “Mommy, first we need eyes.” And, then I asked him what he thought we should use.

We used the pipe cleaners for arms (the wire stuck right into the potato), cotton balls for the beard, pom-pom for the nose, felt for the eyes and mouth, and card stock for the shoes.

We put everything on with either Elmer’s Glue or Scotch tape. The felt on felt didn’t work too well with the glue – but everything else held up.

For the St. Patrick’s Day hat, I simply used card stock. I cut a circle for the best, and then I rolled another piece into a cylinder. I centered the cylinder on the base and taped it on top.

We tied a ribbon around the hat – and placed an Irish sticker where the buckle would go, which made a nice touch 🙂

Then, we decided to paint the cotton orange, in an effort to make our Mr. Potato Head craft look more like a leprechaun.

It got pretty messy – and orange got all over Mr. Potato Head, but he definitely started to uphold his title as a leprechaun.

After we finished with the Mr. Potato Head craft, my little guy said, “Time for the other potato, mommy…” Just when I thought we were done 🙂

So, we made a Mrs. Potato Head. We used all of the same things, and added a felt and pom-pom bow in her hair.

Just when we were about done *again,* my son says, “Mommy, what about baby potato?”

And, I wished I had thought to get a smaller potato because that would have been cute to have a whole Mr. Potato Head family made from potatoes.

After the potatoes dried, my little guy loved playing with them.

He named Mrs. Potato Head “Nana,” which I don’t think my mom found complimentary 😉

I did have trouble getting the potatoes to stand up straight. I had wished I cut off the bottom to make a flat surface, but I’m sure this would have shortened their shelf life.

[As a side note, I recently learned that when you leave potatoes out and exposed to light, they absorb radiation in the air (shout out to Anthony William’s amazing book “Life-Changing Foods.”) So not only will Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head be decorating our kitchen for the next 5 or so days, but they will be absorbing some of the toxins we are exposed to.]

Always a teacher, I also use our crafts as a segway to reading. During our library trip this week, we’ll be reading about St. Patrick’s Day and leprechauns, and the Mr. Potato Head craft served as pre-learning activity.

Overall, our Mr. Real Potato Head craft was definitely a success. My son had a ball preparing for the craft, making REAL potato heads, and playing with his new, clumsy figures.

It’s amazing to see the joy he gets from creating something he’s proud of.

Fun Valentine’s Day Scavenger Hunt

January 20, 2017 by Eileen 73 Comments

Last Valentine’s Day I threw together a little scavenger hunt for Ash. Every now and then I try to do something sweet 😉

Although too young to actively participate, our son was the star – as all of the clues were written in his point of view and revolved around him too.

One example was “This is where I like to sit and read…” and the clue was hidden under his Mickey Mouse couch in the playroom where he would pretend read.

Another clue was “I haven’t learned to walk yet, but I love to run” and the clue was in his exersaucer – the little thing where toddlers “run” in circles. 🙂

It turned out super cute, and I had a good laugh watching Ash run around the house looking for the clues. And, getting stumped a few more times than I would have thought.

A New Valentine’s Tradition

A few weeks ago, I was thinking about Valentines crafts and activities and making the scavenger hunt.

So, I dug out the clues and LOVED reading through them – it’s crazy how much kids change so much in one year!

I mean last year our toddler had about a five-word vocabulary and was relying mainly on sign language to tell us “more,” “hungry,” or “sleepy.”

This year, he is speaking in mostly run-on sentences: “No, mommy I don’t like carrots, actually, I would like more rice for lunch for me, please mommy, I really want rice.” :):)

Reading through all of the clues definitely took Ash and I back. So much – that I decided a Valentine’s Scavenger Hunt would be a recurring thing in this household.

There is so much stress and planning and travel involved with Thanksgiving and Christmas that it will be fun to have a special Valentine’s tradition in our family 🙂

This year, our toddler can help make it – or help Ash find all the clues. Or both 🙂

Materials for the Making a Scavenger Hunt

Card stock or construction paper
Sharpie
Scissors – love squiggly scissors
Prize to go with the last clue

Making a Scavenger Hunt

First, I typed up the clues on the computer, using a cute font with hearts. You can also hand write them – or have your kids write them.

Then, I printed them out and cut them up using squiggly scissors. I love these scissors because they disguise my lack of being able to cut in straight lines. Next, I glued them to card stock.

Here was the tricky part – labeling the clues so that they are put in the right places. So if the first clue is “This is where I sit and read” and the answer is the couch. This clue is not the one that gets hidden on the couch. The following card will be hidden on the couch.

So, I labeled the back of each card with the place where that card was hidden – NOT with the answer to that question. This made the clues easy to hide.

And, the answers were still labeled (for later re-reading), they were just on the back of the next card.

The last clue can be hidden with a prize. Our last clue led Ash to the mini fridge in his office (my old dorm room fridge is still humming!), where there was a sweet treat for him 🙂

Binding the Scavenger Hunt Clues

After Ash collected all the clues, I bound them all together using a hole punch in the top left corner of each card, and then a loose leaf binder ring to keep them together.

This was so much easier and more organized than a rubber band or paper clip because you can flip right through them.

I also use these binder rings to bind together the Christmas cards we received each year 🙂 Love them!

I’m looking forward to see this year’s hunt. Our little guy might give Ash a run for his money 🙂

And, I’m sure next year I’ll flipping through this year’s clues saying I can’t believe how much our little guy has grown… again 🙂

How to Easily Make Valentines Finger Puppets

January 15, 2017 by Eileen 99 Comments

I cannot believe it’s already halfway through January. This past holiday season flew. Thanksgiving sprang up on me, and then Christmas – I was still running around buying gifts a few days prior, which is really unlike me.

Now that it’s a new year, I’m getting back to my old ways and getting myself organized ahead of time. There’s so just so much unnecessary stress when you are running behind.

That being said, I’ve already been working on this year’s Valentine’s Day crafts! Wahoo!

And, this is a good one – Valentines felt finger puppets!

They are so simple and so cute – it’s the perfect Valentine’s activity for kids. Not to mention, I made them from scrap materials.

My son is a little obsessed with nursery rhymes – Wheels on the Bus, Hot Cross Buns, and most recently a song called “The Finger Family,” which essentially uses finger puppets for family members. He sings it probably about 50 times a day.

The other day he took off all the marker caps and placed them on his fingers and started singing “Mommy Finger, Mommy Finger, Where are you?”Before I chimed in with, “Here I am, Here I am, How do you do? (I’m not helping the obsession), I realized he needed some real finger puppets.

I thought about using photos and using our family – or just drawing some pictures with him – but then I thought I could tie it into a fun Valentine’s Day activity.

Making Felt Finger Puppets

It would have been super simple to use the fingers on a pair of gloves – but gloves are way too precious around here.

So, I used my go-to material – felt.

I was determined to use all scraps for this project – and I successfully did so. I didn’t spend a penny.

Felt Finger Puppet Materials:

One sheet of felt
Card stock/construction paper
Sharpie/markers
Hot glue gun
Scissors
Regular glue

Steps for Making Felt Finger Puppets

I used just one sheet of felt for all ten fingers. Then, I liberally traced my pointer finger eight times and my thumb twice.

After, I cut slits in between each of the traced fingers, so I could quickly fold them up (to be double sided) after I hot glued them. This worked like a charm.

Here’s a picture I quickly snapped of going over the outline with hot glue – and then folding it up.

Next, I cut off the excess felt. This took a little patience, since the glue/outline was inside. I roughly cut them and then ended up putting my pinky finger in each puppet and then carefully cutting off any additional excess.

I now had one hand ready to go 🙂

At this point, my son was begging to play with them. He was so excited about the finger puppets that I didn’t have the heart to say no.

So, I gave him these five and decided to make a second hand.

After both hands were done, it was time to get creative with heart-shaped animals.

I used a small cookie cutter to get the shape of the heart perfect and consistent for all of the fingers. It worked out really well 🙂

Before I knew it, I had a frog, chicken, penguin, panda, fox, lady bug, fish, fox, bunny, and a dog/mouse that was originally a bear.

You can see in the top of the picture (below) that I used garage sale stickers to put some quick faces on the puppets while my son waited for the animals.

Decorating the Felt Finger Puppets

You can be as creative as you like making the felt finger puppets. Aside from the cookie cutter, I cut the rest of the hearts freehand.

One of those heart paper punches would have been perfect for this – but I was determined to make this a no-cost project 🙂

I also had some heart stickers lying around, but I liked using the card stock colors and patterns. I put some googly eyes on the lady bug – they were a little big – but it shows how you can incorporate some other crafty materials, too.

After the animals were done, I hot glued each to a finger puppet – and voila! We had an Animal Finger Family.

My favorite is the chicken. It turned out so cute 🙂

Here are a few more close-ups:For longevity, you could laminate the animals (before the googly eyes and before gluing to the finger puppet), making the felt finger puppets more durable. You could do this either with a home laminator or using packaging tape.

I’ve used both, and each works well 🙂

And my son, well he LOVED these puppets. Needless to say, all we’ve been hearing is “Froggie finger, Froggie finger, where are you?”

And of course, we keep the song going 🙂

Easy Thank You Cards for Kids to Make

January 1, 2017 by Eileen 47 Comments

With the holidays over and those playrooms bursting with new toys, it’s about time to start sending thank you notes.

I’m strong believer in the importance of thank you cards from kids – when somebody puts the time and thought into buying a gift, they should get a special, handwritten note in return.

With my son still being a toddler, I’m doing most of the writing for his gifts; however, he still helps make the cards – and I try to make the homemade card ideas easy and creative.

Today, I’m sharing four simple kids thank you card ideas.

These homemade thank you cards are easy and always make the fridge 🙂

Also, these homemade thank you cards from toddlers and kids could be used for any occasion – not just for kids thank you cards 🙂

1. Cut-Out Thank You Card Ideas

This type of homemade card is my favorite and the simplest for younger kids like toddlers.

First, use a cookie cutter to trace a few shapes on card stock. We used stars, hearts, Christmas trees, and gingerbread people.

As far as paper, I always use card stock for homemade thank you cards from toddlers because its thicker than construction paper. So when the paint is layered on like the ways kids love to paint, the card doesn’t bend.

I also like the colors of card stock better than ordinary construction paper. They are brighter and more fun, which definitely ups its refrigerator-worthyness.

Then, simply cut the shapes out for your child to paint on. You can then glue these shapes to a folded piece of card stock to make perfectly easy homemade thank you cards from toddlers and kids.

Toddler and Baby Variation: You can also do a variation of this homemade card – which is great for younger ones: Have your child paint all freely over a piece of card stock. Toddlers could use brushes or q-tips. Younger ones could use their hands. Once dry, you can trace the cookie cutters and cut out the shapes.

I did something similar with the below Christmas trees. Using my toddler’s painted paper, I cut out strips and shaped them into trees. It’s his painting, but cut into a pretty shape.

If your child comes home from preschool or daycare with lots of “abstract” freestyle paints, you can always cut them up to make one of these cute homemade thank you cards from toddlers.

After, glue your cut-outs onto another piece of cardstock and fold into a card.

Your child can continue to decorate the homemade card – my toddler used q-tips and paint to further decorate the trees. You could also use stickers or ribbon – or scribbled markers or crayons works too.

These homemade kids thank you cards turned out so cute and were so easy for mama to oversee 🙂

2. Potato Stamped Homemade Cards

Always looking for new sensory play activities, I decided to give potato stamps a try. It was way easier than I thought it would be – and my son had a ball.

This might just be our new go-to card.

First, cut off the top of the potato. Then, press in a cookie cutter of your choice.

I thought only metal cookie cutters would work; yet, the plastic heart cookie cutter (below) went into the potato without a problem 🙂

After that, use a knife cut the excess from around the cookie cutter, slowly moving your knife around the border of the cookie cutter.

You are left with an awesome stamp that’s easy for kids to paint.

I got a little creative and did a double-sided stamp on this potato – with a star on one side and a heart on the other.

This encouraged my son to be more involved – getting messy and flipping the potato to see the shapes. This is great for kids messy play ideas!

This could also be a fingerpaint activity or a paintbrush activity. And, potato stamped notes don’t have to be for kids thank you cards – they could used for any occasion or even a rainy day activity.

3. Painters Tape Lettered Kids Cards

Use painters tape to spell out a word – such as “Thanks” and then have your child paint freely.

When the paint is still a little tacky, remove the tape from the card.

Definitely use painters tape for best results. I lazily used electrical tape this time and it peeled terribly.

4. Fingerprint Balloons Homemade Card Ideas

Handprint, footprint, and fingerprint cards are usually not my favorite. It’s usually too structured for my little one; however, we got a really cute homemade card with a few single fingerprints.

We turned them into letter balloons which my toddler loved.

Simply put a little of each of the colors you are using on a palette or piece of paper, and have your child dip their finger into each color and then make the print.

The number of prints will depend on the number of letters in the word.

Once dry, use a sharpie to write on the letters and draw the balloon knot and string. This balloon card is definitely an easy thank you card to make.

Kids Homemade Thank You Cards Tips…

If you will be mailing the kids thank you cards, keep in mind envelope size – or you might be making an unnecessary trip to the post office. With some of the above cards, you might want to cut the card to size before starting. I always do this so I’m not cutting up my kids thank you card after he made it.
If you feel like your toddler wasn’t as involved as you would have liked during the thank you card making process, have them accessorize the cards with stickers, color on the front, inside, or back of the creation. This preserves the cards refrigerator-worthy quality but also makes it more of their own. Either way – they will be proud of their creation!
More is always better! Even if you only plan to make one thank you card, have your children paint extra, in case they run their paint-streaked hands across the creation just when you were on the way to the sink for cleanup 🙂 Or, if it doesn’t turn out the way you thought, you have a couple to choose from 🙂 Or, when you are scrambling for a birthday card for someone, you’ll have a secret homemade card stash.

My son had a great time making these homemade kid-friendly thank you cards. Arts and crafts is one of his favorite activities, as it’s special time we spend together. He also takes such great pride in giving his homemade cards to his special family members, which is super cute 🙂

Not to mention our family members love the creativity involved and appreciate the time we took to make them something special. If you are looking for some ideas for homemade thank you cards from toddlers and kids, I hope these card ideas helped you out!

I do have to say, the cards definitely make the fridge 🙂

Check out some of our other toddler card ideas too!

How to Make a Spectacular DIY Advent Calendar

December 7, 2016 by Eileen 83 Comments

With the holiday season quickly approaching and my toddler reaching an age where he can learn from and enjoy holiday learning activities, I set out to find an Advent calendar that our family would enjoy.

However, I couldn’t find one that was suitable. Some were filled with chocolates (which negates our healthy lifestyle), some where filled with gifts (I don’t want him to get caught up in the gift aspect of the holiday), and some had numbers that were too small or simply didn’t stand out enough for a toddler to easily recognize.

So I did what I do best – I created my own.

And I’m sure you can easily guess that I made the homemade Advent calendar out of felt. This year has definitely been the year of felt for me 🙂

I’m going to cut right to the chase since we are already a few days into December! It was a little time-consuming, but I love the way it turned out. It provides quite a few learning opportunities, and we can use it year after year.

Homemade Advent Calendar Materials

Green Felt – for the tree and bottom layer
White Felt – or other background color
Felt Pieces in various colors – (I bought a new package for more colors but ended up using scraps I already had)
Free Printable for the Tree Outline (keep scrolling for printable and instructions)
Hot Glue Gun – for attaching the felt
Numbers – Make sure you have enough for numbers 1-25.
Ribbon – for attaching the ornaments to the tree
Buttons – to hang the ornaments on
Basic sewing materials – thread, needle, scissors – for attaching the buttons to the felt but you could skip this and use hot glue
Wooden dowel – for hanging
Decorative ribbon, if desired

How to Make the an Advent Calendar out of Felt

I was excited to get work on the homemade Advent calendar. I started with the background and large pieces and worked my way down to the ornaments.

Making the Background and Tree

First, I cut the large felt pieces, and I must say, this was the hardest part. I simply am terrible at cutting in a straight line. Why don’t squiggly scissors worked on felt?!

I cut a piece of white background to be 18 inches by 22 inches. My reason for this was that I already had an interactive alphabet of this size hanging from a wooden dowel. I figured I could borrow the dowel; although I ended up finding another one in the garage.

After that, I drew a Christmas tree onto green felt using a sharpie. It took me a few tries to get all of the branches right and to maximize my use of felt. I really marked up the back of it.

To save you the same work, I am sharing the outline that I drew. It’s on two sheets of paper, and I want to note that the bottom of the Christmas tree was a little too big for standard paper.

Therefore, the second page looks like it cuts off. However, it’s not a mistake – the tree was just a too wide. So I let it run off the edges, figuring it would be easy for you to just connect these few lines – easier than drawing your own tree, at least 🙂

Click here for the tree template.

Next, I cut a little brown rectangle out of my felt scraps for the tree stump.

Then I hot glued the tree and the stump to the the white background.

Attaching Buttons to the Advent Calendar

Even though felt sticks to felt, I wanted to use buttons and ribbon for this Advent calendar to provide another learning opportunity to my son – using buttons.

I found 25 buttons from a collection that I had. I love these buttons – especially their varying hues and textures all although within the same color family.

First, I spaced the buttons out, and then I sewed them on. Also, I put four buttons under the tree for the presents I was going to make.

You also could hot glue the buttons; however, I wanted the sewed look 🙂

Making Ornaments for the Advent Calendar

Now came for the daunting part – 25 shapes to make! Yet, an idea dawned on me… cookie cutters! I used my Christmas cookie cutters to trace a bunch of the shapes – the gingerbread man, snowman, and candy cane, to name a few.

If you are trying to cut down on the work, you could use just a few shapes and repeat them.

The rest of the shapes I outlined or I just cut. If I’m not sure how to draw something or I want a shape simplified, I google an outline of it.

Looking at just the outline makes it easy to emulate. I did that with the angel, and she turned out great!

Adding Decorative Ribbon

My shapes were looking a little boring, so I used holiday ribbon to spruce them up. Just a line of ribbon here and there, actually, went a long way in turning my boring felt shapes into cute pieces.

For example, on the snowman (pictured above), I used a line of ribbon instead of buttons.

The line of ribbon on the train spruced up its plainness. And, even the faceless gingerbread man look pretty spiffy. I didn’t want to fill them up too much though because I still had the Advent numbers to add.

Adding Ribbon Hooks

Next, I needed to attach ribbon to the felt, so the ornaments could hang from the buttons on the Christmas tree. I used this green ribbon (from our wedding programs!), and simply looped one end around the other.

To keep the loop, I put a bead of hot glue to hold the overlapping ribbon pieces (right above where my finger is).

Once glued, I added another bead of hot glue to the criss-cross and attached it to the back of the ornament.

Attaching the Calendar Dates

Next, I needed to add the dates. I went to Michael’s specially to pick these up – got caught up in all the sales, and completely forgot about it.

Not wanting to waste another trip out to a craft store (and not wanting to wait for Amazon prime delivery – two day seemed like too much!), I started to cut out my own numbers out of felt using a template. They looked horrible! It was just too many imperfect twos!

The next day, I picked the below numbers up at Michaels.

They are simply adhesive cardboard numbers, so they didn’t stick that well. I had to use hot glue to give them a good stick – and that was a lot of gluing plus a burnt pinky.

In hindsight, I should have gotten felt ones from Amazon. They have a bunch of felt numbers. When you do purchase your numbers, make sure you have enough 1s and 2s.

With these adhesives, at first I wasn’t crazy about the sharp contrast that the glitterly black created, but it’s grown on me.

And, they are very easy to read, which makes them perfect for my toddler.

When you are sticking on the numbers, make sure to lay them out ahead of time. Put the single digit numbers on the smaller ornaments – to make sure that every number has a good shape to fit on.

I barely was able to squeeze the 25 onto the star, since the star is the last thing that goes on the tree 🙂

The ornaments look so cute – and I think it was that ribbon 🙂 Faceless gingerbread man is definitely my favorite, yet, Frosty is a close second.

Finishing Touches

After the ornaments for the homemade Advent calendar were done, I went back to the tree. It looked a little drab with the white background, so I cut yet another piece of green felt and hot glued it behind the white. It provided a border, a little depth, and hid my sewing.

The tree still looked like it needed a little sprucing up (haha get it?!), so I ran a line of ribbon across the bottom.

I also used this same ribbon to create tabs to run the wooden dowel through. I was planning to use felt for this, but the ribbon was perfect – and tied it all together.

Here’s a close up of a the completed DIY Advent calendar.

I love how the homemade Advent calendar turned out, and my son is learning a ton!

He is learning to follow a number sequence, identify holiday shapes, create connections between the items on this tree and the items on our real trees, apply his fine motor skills on the use buttons, and practice responsibility, as it is his job everyday to find and hang up the next number.

He also loves that he has own tree and ornaments and that he doesn’t have to ask mommy in advance if he can touch them 🙂

Here is the entire tree, with some of the ornaments hanging. In the second picture, you can see how the tree is hanging.

The calendar is going to be a little crowded when all of the numbers are on – but they all do fit, and the homemade Advent calendar is the perfect size for small spaces and doors.

Not only do I love a great learning activity, but I love holiday traditions. This homemade Advent calendar will now be one in our home 🙂

Adorable Thanksgiving Place Cards Kids Can Make

November 11, 2016 by Eileen 82 Comments

Looking for a Thanksgiving craft to do with your kids this week? Whether or not you are hosting Thanksgiving dinner, making place cards for the holiday meal is a great activity for kids of all ages.

Not only do children love painting and decorating, but they get to design a special setting for the special people in their lives. It’s a great way for kids to participate in the holiday preparation.

The best thing about the template is that it’s completely customizable.

Using this free printable, you can have your toddler making fingerprint turkeys or your older children painting more elaborate turkeys.

Thanksgiving Place Cards that Kids Can Make

With this thanksgiving place card template, you can be as creative as you like: you could have your kids use finger prints for the turkey feathers or they could glue on skittles or feathers in the shape of a turkey. You could even skip the turkey design altogether and have your child practice writing their letters.

The possibilities are truly endless, as the place card template has lots of open space for creativity.

There are even dotted lines for you or your child to cut out the place settings 🙂

Thanksgiving Place Cards Materials

Free Thanksgiving place card printable – see above
Card stock
Kids paints
Scissors
Sharpie
Any other decorating materials (stickers, crayons, markers for decorating the back or inside)

Instructions for Thanksgiving Place Cards

First, I printed the template on card stock. There are four per page, and remember that it’s always good to have a few extra. My toddler smeared paint across quite a few of them before we even started 🙂

Next, I had my toddler paint the turkeys on. You can have your child make finger prints or use q-tips. I love using q-tips (rather than paintbrushes) for toddler painting. It’s more controlled, easy for kids to use, and quick to clean up!

After they dried, I drew on the eyes, beak, and feet with a sharpie. Then you (or your child) can cut them out. The dotted lines make it easy 🙂

After folding, the thanksgiving place cards that the kids made are ready!

If you have a little one and are doing fingerprints rather than painting or q-tips, your place cards might look more like this (see picture below)… a little sloppier but still adorable 🙂

For extension ideas, you can also have your child decorate the inside or back of the place card – through coloring, through choosing stickers for each person, or through writing a note.

Fun Fall Turkey Craft for Toddlers

September 29, 2016 by Eileen 92 Comments

I just love everything about fall – the decorations, the food, the crafts, and the fact that it means Christmas is coming. 🙂

My son is at such a fun age right now because we can start doing seasonal activities together.

Of course, the teacher in me always has to tie learning in, too. Today, we worked on color sorting and color matching with this paper bag turkey craft.

Paper Bag Turkey Puppet Materials

The materials for the fall turkey craft are so simple that you probably already have all of them around your house.

When collecting my materials, I couldn’t find any orange tissue paper, so I just used orange construction paper in its place. Tissue worked better, but the construction paper also turned out fine 🙂

Construction paper – 5 or so colors
Tissue paper – colors that match the construction paper
Brown paper bag
A pair of googly eyes (you could also just use white paper and draw the pupils on)
Scissors
Glue
Pen, if needed to draw feather outline

Paper Bag Turkey Craft Instructions

First, I made sure I had 5 colors of construction paper and 5 matching tissue paper colors. Then, I cut strips of the tissue paper into little squares that could be easily crumbled. I put all of the squares in a big messy pile, and let my little one sort the colors into piles (first learning task:)
Next, I put the five sheets of construction paper in a neat pile and cut out a turkey feather. With the sheets of construction paper in a pile, I only had to cut out one feather 🙂
After that, we glued the eyes on the paper bag, and I made a few little construction paper shapes for the turkey’s mouth – two triangles and a teardrop shape.
Then, I had my little helper crumple the pieces of tissue and match them to the coordinating feather. He had a great time matching the colors to the feathers (second learning task:)). After he matched them, we glued all of the pieces down, feather-by-feather.
Once all of the tissue was glued to each feather, we glued the feathers to the back of the brown bag with a strip of glue.

Here’s my little helper adding a few more pieces on at the end.

The finished paper bag turkey craft! It took very little time to prepare and was a great learning activity to do together.

And, my little guy loves that it’s a puppet! We might be making more puppet friends for Mr. Turkey tomorrow 🙂

Looking for more thanksgiving craft ideas? There are some awesome fall projects on All Free Holiday Crafts that inspired me with this paper bag color-sorting turkey puppet.

How to Make a DIY Hopscotch Mat

September 7, 2016 by Eileen 48 Comments

I’m always looking for simple do-it-yourself activities and games for my toddler to learn from and enjoy.

While planning his birthday party, I was looking to make different station-like games for kids to walk up to and play with.

Through scouring the Internet for ideas, I came across a cool hopscotch idea, where a blogger made a homemade hopscotch game from carpet samples from Home Depot. I loved this idea because it was so creative and resourceful.

I looked into making it, and the carpet samples were quite cheap. However, I was worried about toddlers who are still working on their balance tripping on the carpet squares, especially because they weren’t stuck to each other.

This was all occurring during my felt craze, and then it dawned on me.

I could make a felt hopscotch mat that I could unroll inside or outside for my toddler and his friends to play with.

It turned out awesome – it’s definitely my favorite DIY this year.

Not only did it look store-bought (I love when my DIYs look store-bought!), but it even inspired my son to learn his numbers. Here’s how to make a hopscotch mat.

Materials for the DIY Hopscotch Mat

Here are the materials and the steps for making this homemade felt hopscotch game.

One 2-yard piece of felt – I used this felt fabric in green from Crafty Cuts, which measured 72 inches x 36 inches. I like this brand of felt because it was nice, thick, and not slippery! (Some felt can be slippery like the kind you buy in craft stores in rolls). This material served as a perfect mat. (I even used a small piece of this cut for the lamp post in our photo booth backdrop)
15 pieces of felt in colors of your choice – 5 of these will be used for your numbers (2 per sheet), and 10 of these will be used for the hopscotch squares. I used a variety pack from a craft store, but Amazon has some great felt variety packs too. I used the size 9″ x 12.”
Glue – I used hot glue to stick the numbers to the squares and the squares to the felt. It held up just fine but I had to use a lot of glue. I didn’t try fabric or felt glue, but I know those choices are out there too.
Number Pattern – I made a free printable (see below) for my numbers. To save ink, you’ll notice I took a few short cuts. I only printed the 1 once (use the stencil for the 1 and the 10), and I didn’t include the 9 (use the 6).
Scissors

How to Make a Hopscotch Mat

Making the hopscotch was really simple. It’s a no-sew project that doesn’t take up too much time, and yields a great result.

Creating the Layout for the DIY Hopscotch Mat

First, I laid out the green 2-yard felt piece. Then I started to pick colors for the squares. After I had picked out my colors – yellow, pink, and two shades of blue, I laid everything down, creating a pattern that I liked.

Cutting the Felt Squares for the Mat

After the layout was down, I needed to cut the ten rectangular felt pieces into squares.

To make this as simple as possible, since the pieces were 9″ by 12,” I just cut the 12″ side to 9″ to make a 9″ by 9″ with just one cut per piece.

Also, I used my paper cutter to cut the felt. This made the process of cutting felt perfectly a cinch because I can never get a perfectly straight line with scissors.

I don’t leave my paper cutter sitting out anymore with my son running around; however the paper cutter I use takes 30 seconds to set up, and you only need to set up part of it to get a good cut.

For someone a busy mom who can’t cut straight, it’s simple and perfect!

Making the Numbers for the DIY Hopscotch Mat

After I cut the ten number squares, I started on the numbers. I decided to use felt to make the numbers. I tried fabric paint and a few other types of paint – but it just didn’t look professional.

So, I made a quick little number printable, and then cut out the numbers to use as stencils.

And, for efficiency, I skipped any redundant numbers (one stencil for 6 and 9).

Next I simply held the stencil over the black felt (I used all black for the numbers) and cut as precisely as I could.

I could have traced the stencils onto the felt first and then cut, but I skipped this time for the sake of time.

Gluing the Pieces Together

Afterward, I glued the black numbers onto the colored felt squares.

Then I started gluing the colored squares to the green felt background. It was turning out so nicely 🙂

The completed hopscotch mat 🙂 Along with a few other party decorations – the photo booth backdrop and the Sesame pom-poms in the background.

Before the party, we used the hopscotch mat in the house, as a little reading carpet. My son learned his numbers quickly and would pick a different number to sit on each time we would read 🙂

This cute, very simple to make, hopscotch mat can serve as a game or a reading mat.

The cost of the project was very little – I bought most things at the craft stores with coupons, and I used the variety pack of felt for numerous other projects, with a large pile still left.

To give an estimate, I would say I didn’t spend more than $15. I love it so much that I’m looking to make another felt mat as a reading mat for my son’s reading corner.

If you are looking for a fun activity for kids that involve learning, definitely consider making a hopscotch mat.

Easy Homemade Elmo and Cookie Monster Cupcakes

August 25, 2016 by Eileen 36 Comments

The Sesame Street desserts were my favorite part of my son’s Sesame themed party. Based on the rave reviews, I think they were my guests’ favorite part too. I made a huge Elmo cake and then I made homemade Elmo and Cookie Monster cupcakes.

I just loved how the homemade Elmo cake turned out… so much that I was actually sad cutting into it.

The DIY Elmo cake was a 12″ two-layer, gluten-free vanilla cake with chocolate icing. Red sprinkles covered the sides of the cake, along with two Elmo face cut-outs – made from cut-out cookies and chocolate melts.

The homemade Elmo and Cookie Monster cupcakes were regular vanilla cake with chocolate icing and decorated with sprinkles, icing tubes, and chocolate chip cookie halves to resemble Elmo and Cookie Monster.

Our guests were totally impressed with the Sesame Street desserts – and the homemade Elmo and Cookie Monster cakes were so easy to decorate.

DIY Cookie Monster Cupcakes Video

How to Make Elmo and Cookie Monster Cupcakes

After making the homemade Elmo and Cookie Monster cupcake batter, I filled the muffin liners 3/4 of the way full. I wanted to have a nice dome at the top of the cupcake. If the cupcake was too flat, the Sesame Street faces would be harder to make and wouldn’t look as nice.

Elmo and Cookie Monster Cupcake Decorating Materials:

a large bag of red sprinkles for the Elmo cakes – I looked for just red and just blue sprinkles everywhere – Michaels, Joann, AC Moore, Walmart, Target, the grocery stores – and couldn’t find any! I found these on Amazon. The bags are pretty big, and I had a lot of extra 🙂
a large bag of blue sprinkles for the Cookie Monster cakes
chocolate chip cookies – broken in half and used for Cookie Monster’s mouth. Homemade or store-bought both work fine. I made a batch of chocolate chip cookies a week earlier and put about a dozen (broken in half) aside and froze them for the cupcakes. Working with frozen cookies was easier too.
icing tubes in white, black, and orange .- used for the eyes, mouth, and Elmo’s nose. When looking through the aisles at Joann and Michael’s for ideas, I kept seeing pre-made candy eyes. I preferred using icing because those little candies can be a choking hazard for little ones.

Pictured above is my Cookie Monster cupcake set-up.

For Elmo’s mouth, you could always use half of an Oreo, but since I already had a black tube of icing for the pupils and I didn’t have Oreos – I went with the easier option.

If you are thinking of making the Elmo cake also, you can use leftover sprinkles and icing tubes from the cupcakes 🙂

How to Make Cookie Monster Cupcakes

First, after the homemade cupcakes cooled, I iced them. I was running a little low on icing, so I put just enough on so that the sprinkles would have something to stick too.
Next, I filled a small bowl with blue sprinkles, and then I flipped the iced cupcake upside down and dipped it into the sprinkles. I twisted it around a little to give the sprinkles a good stick.
Then, I used a white tube of icing to make Cookie’s eyes. I first made a circle outline and then carefully filled it in.
After that, I used the black tube of icing to make the pupils. I made sure to make one higher than the other, as that is Cookie’s signature look.
When the eyes were done, I took a chocolate chip cookie half and ran a strip of icing across the edge of the cookie (the part that would to stick to the cupcake), and then stuck it on.

I used a pizza pan to put the cupcakes on, so the Cookie Monster sprinkles didn’t run everywhere.

A cookie sheet would be fine too, but I was using all of those for my butterscotch batches that were baking.

Here is a picture of the finished Cookie Monster cupcakes.

The homemade cupcakes turned out so cute and were much easier to make with sprinkles, rather than the blue icing 🙂 The only decorating that was needed was the eyes. So these Cookie Monster cupcakes are pretty fool-proof!

How to Make Elmo Cupcakes

For the homemade Elmo cupcakes, I took almost the exact same steps as the Cookie Monster cupcakes listed above: I baked the cupcakes large so they would have a dome, iced the top, and then dunked them into a bowl of red sprinkles.

I then used the icing tubes to draw on the face. A little more skill was required for Elmo’s nose, eyes, and mouth (compared to just Cookie’s eyes), and I was tired from baking all day – but they still turned out pretty nice.

If your toddler can recognize Elmo, then you know it looks pretty good 🙂

The Elmo Cake

The Elmo cake consisted of three main parts – the Elmo face cut-outs used on the sides of the cake, the icing, and the actual cake. All of them were pretty simple to make. I made the face cut-outs the night before I did the Elmo cake, so two nights before the party. Then I made the Elmo cake and icing the day before. I also did the Elmo cake decorating the day before.

Elmo Cake Decorating Materials

Listed below are all of the materials for the Elmo cake. I had 50+ people coming, so I wanted to have plenty of Sesame Street desserts to go around.

Large Round Cake Pan – I used a 12″ cake pan, found on Amazon. It came in a set of four cake pans for $26, as it included a 6″, 8″, 10″, and a 12.” I figured if I was going to undertake this Elmo cake endeavor this year that I was sure to use the other sizes in future endeavors (maybe a tiered cake next year?). I also compared prices at Michaels, AC Moore, and Joann, and even with a coupon, this was the best deal.
Cardboard Cake Circle – I hemmed and hawed about purchasing these 14″ cake circles, and I’m so glad I did because in hindsight, I wouldn’t have pulled off this cake without them. Not only did they make taking the cake out of the pan so easy, but I also used them to hold the cake while in the fridge, and they easily allowed me to place the cake right on top of the cake holder. With a cake this big, cookie sheets and regular round plates would not have been a help at all.
Double Recipe of Cake Batter – I made my cake gluten-free from the most amazing recipe. Yammie’s Gluten Freedom has a recipe called The Best Gluten Free White Cake Ever. Instead of using eight egg whites, I used four whole eggs, and instead of using her gluten free flour blend, I used this one from America’s Test Kitchen called America’s Test Kitchen’s Gluten Free Flour Blend. It’s the only gluten-free recipe I have used that people have no idea it’s gluten-free. Even my gluten-loving husband was fooled. However, you can use any cake batter recipe for this – even two cake boxes. 🙂
Double Recipe of Icing – I used a chocolate recipe that my mom makes for every family birthday. It’s quite simple but results in a lot of taste-testing for the correct balance of sugar and chocolate.
Extra icing or icing tubes for decorating – I used the leftover orange icing tube from the Elmo cupcakes to write on the cake, and also I used the leftover chocolate icing to do borders on the cake.
Red sprinkles – These are for the sides of the cake – to make Elmo red. I found a great bag of red sprinkles on Amazon that I used on the cupcakes and the cake, and I still have leftovers.
Elmo’s eyes/nose cut-outs – I made these from cut-out cookies. In addition to having cut-out cookie batter (I made a half-batch), you’ll need candy melts in orange, black, and white. You will have lots of leftovers from these for future baking projects – or for delicious chocolate covered pretzels. Keep reading for instructions on these 🙂

Decorating the Elmo Cake

So my plan was to make red icing from beets to give the Elmo cake his red color.

I know that sounds crazy, but I didn’t feel like dumping a whole bunch of red dye into the icing that I knew my son would be eating by the spoonful.

I read that beets can be used for red icing, so why not try and make an MSG-free alternative?!

Well, in short, tampering with the beets was a waste of time the day before having a huge party at your house. The beets turned the icing hot pink.

Like really hot pink.

Too bad I wasn’t making an Abby Cadabby cake.

The teacher in me thought that I could still use the hot pink beet icing to ice the cake, and then put the red sprinkles over the side to make Elmo.

Well, that idea sunk when the cake started looking like Valentine’s Day with the hot pink and the bright red.

I laugh now, but oh was I frustrated!

So, how did we get the Elmo cake red?!

We sent Ash out to the store for more powdered sugar, and my sister, who is the icing master, made another huge batch of icing in chocolate.

Our altered plan was to ice the Elmo cake with chocolate frosting and then use the red sprinkles for the sides.

It worked out well, and we absolutely loved the way the Elmo cake looked!

The most time-consuming part, beets aside, was getting the sprinkles to stick to the sides of the cake.

My quick google search showed me there was no good strategy, other than tilting, and I was not tilting a two-layer 12″ cake.

So, I grabbed a handful of sprinkles and pressed them up to the icing to make it stick. It took a while, but it was worth it in the end. I absolutely love the way the Elmo cake turned out.

Making Elmo’s Face Cut-Outs

This was actually the easiest part of making the homemade Elmo cake.

First, I made a half batch of my mom’s cut-out cookies. You can make these a day early and leave the dough refrigerated overnight.

I used circle cookie cutters to get Elmo’s eyes right, overlapping the circles a little. Then, I made two different sizes – a smaller and a larger, so that I could pick the better of the two after they baked.

I made about a half dozen of each version – just to have extras.

For Elmo’s nose, I used a large oval cookie cutter to go with the larger eyes.

Since I didn’t have a smaller oval cookie cutter, I set the large one down in the dough as a guide and used a knife to cut a smaller oval. I made about two or three of each size nose.

As a visual guide, I had an Elmo party hat in front of me that I used on the party decorations. This was helpful to look at as I worked.

After the Elmo face cookies had baked and cooled, I picked from the two sizes I had made. I actually chose the smaller size, and then I got started on the decorating.

I used candy melts in white and black (see materials above).

For the whites of the Elmo’s eyes, I melted the candy melts and half dipped/half iced it onto the cookie.

Then, I simply took two chocolate morsels from the black candy melt bag and stuck them on for Elmo’s pupils.

The size was perfect!

For the orange, I thought I bought orange candy melts, but I hadn’t. Ugh!

I wasn’t making another trip to the store, so I had to improvise and use a little of the orange icing tube that was for nose on the Elmo cupcakes.

I just spread it over the nose cookie until it was smooth. It would have turned out better with the melted candy, as the icing was a little streaky.

But hey, it saved me a trip back out 🙂

If you haven’t used candy melts before, the trick with these (or melting any kind of chocolate in the microwave) is to microwave the morsels for 30 seconds at a time.

After 30 seconds, stir the chocolate up really well. Continue this pattern until the chocolate is all melted.

When you are heating it up in 30 second increments and giving it a good stir in between, you don’t run the risk of burning the chocolate.

Making Abby’s Magical Wands

For Abby’s Magical Wands, I simply bought pretzel sticks and dipped them in hot pink candy melts.

After dipping, I placed them on a cookie sheet lined with wax paper. This contains the drips and sprinkles. I also used some of the white candy melts to drizzle on them too, after the pink had set.

I was so pleased with how the Elmo and Cookie Monster cakes and Abby’s wands turned out. It was definitely my best cake ever.

Last year, I tried to draw on a bear that looked more like a blob….

This year, I used cookies, sprinkles, and chocolate melts to mask my poor decorating skills 🙂

The homemade Elmo and Cookie Monster cupcakes totally impressed my party guests and myself. These simple tutorials show you exactly how you can make your own party desserts.

The homeamde Elmo and Cookie Monster cupcakes were a big hit among the kids! And, the adults loved the cake.

When you enjoy baking and creating something totally awesome, the time spent was absolutely worth it.

And, it was all in a day’s work!