Keeping My Toddler Busy: Father's Day Key Chain

I spent a total of a dollar on Steve's Father's Day gift. Cai and I were shopping at the Dollar Tree and came across this shrinky dink kit.

                                                

It was a sports kit, but it was easy to  just ignore the sports part and do what we wanted with it. I had seen an idea on Pinterest that looked neat, so we went with it. If you've never heard of shrinky dinks, it's basically just plastic paper that you draw on, cut out, and then back for a minute or so in the oven. It shrinks up into a thick hard piece of plastic.

We traced Cai's little hand. Isn't it funny how he always keeps his little pinky bent?

I gave Cai some markers, and he went to town.

I made it a point to give him a variety of colors, but he still gravitated toward the blues.

I then cut it out and poked a hole through it. The whole poking was a little tricky. We then put it on a parchment paper lined cookie sheet and baked it in the oven.

It didn't take long for it to shrink up, and Cai enjoyed watching it. He put on his little play pot holder while we did it.

I punched a little star out with a star punch just for fun too. This was the finished result. The kit came with key chains to attach to it. 

Cai was super excited to give it to Steve in bed on Father's Day morning. I didn't take a picture of the gift giving because I chose to just enjoy the moment instead. As a replacement, I thought I'd share my two favorite Father's Day photos.

Steve taught Cai how to use the drill (he was taking our pool down. We're going to try to put a fire pit and seating area there instead, IF we can do VERY inexpensively. I'll keep you updated on that).

And while he worked, Cai ran in the sprinkler for the first time. He actually loved it, contrary to how it looks in this picture! It was a very enjoyable day all around.

Keeping My Toddler Busy: Painting

This activity was painting with a purpose. I want to redecorate our main bathroom to be a little more fun and kid friendly, and I wanted some artwork on the wall to go with my ideas. So Cai's job was to create it. 

Supplies: 

Paint- I used acrylic craft paint which meant I had to be more careful about him putting his fingers in his mouth, but you could use non toxic paints and finger paints.

Brush- optional. We started out with a foam brush, then switched to fingers

Pallete- I used the back of the lid for the container I keep my paints in. The nice thing about acrylic paint is that it peels off when it's dry.

Canvas- or paper. Hobby Lobby often had sales on canvas. I happened to already have one that I bought a while ago for another project.

Drop cloth: I cut a garbage bag open and laid it on the floor.

We used a little bit of every color.

 Cai started out with a foam brush.

 He very quickly ended up with some on his face.

 I got frustrated with the brush because he basically smeared it all and made brownish green paint, so we switched to using his finger.

I found it worked best to hold the canvas for him and help direct him to the unpainted areas. Of course, I'm planning on using the painting for something specific. If you were just doing this for fun, there would be no need to direct like I did.

I was really glad we did this on a wipeable floor, because at one point he stepped on the canvas and made a footprint on the floor.

 Our finished work.

 Our finished pallet, a work of art itself.

 Our workspace when we were done.

The babe. He had to stop and examine the first two spots of paint he got on himself. He quickly got over that. A bath followed. :)

Keeping My Toddler Busy: Sidewalk Chalk

This activity is pretty self explanatory. I bought Cai sidewalk chalk for his Easter basket, and he is just starting to be interested in using it. 

 As with every other coloring utensil, he gravitates toward the blue.

It's a great opportunity to teach colors!

Cai was in just a diaper because it was so hot out the day we did this. And, for the record, we still use cloth diapers, but I was behind on laundry the day with did this. :)

Keeping My Toddler Busy: Stringing Beads

 I've decided to do a series on the different activities I've been trying with Cai now that his attention span is longer. I'm determined to make sure we do some kind of activity at least three days a week this summer. I have a tendency to be a lazy mom, so it's important for me to force myself to try new activities with him. I'm all for independent playing and getting him to use his imagination, but I also want us to make memories doing things together. Besides, I love crafts!

The first activity we're sharing is simply stringing beads. Obviously this activity needs to be well supervised, lest your toddler stick a bead somewhere it doesn't belong (Cai likes to put them in his mouth and then spit them out).

Supplies:
Beads- I used pony beads and some beads I made myself a while ago out of polymer clay.
String- I recommend something with a stiff end, depending on your toddler's fine motor skills. I feel like Cai's are pretty good for an 18 month old, but I don't think he could have done this with just a piece of yarn. I used these.

Other than just handing him beads or putting letter beads in the right spot to spell his name, I didn't do much.

Sometimes I had to hold the string still for him.

Or help him shake the bead down past his fingers.

For the most part though, this was an activity he was able to do on his own after some help and some modeling.

He enjoyed wearing the finished result.

I'm pretty sure he was eating actual food here and not a bead. ;)

The nice/not nice thing about those elastic Silkies is that you can easily take the beads off and restring them. That means that if I need to keep Cai busy while he's wearing his necklace, I can let him take the beads off and do it all over again. That also means that when he was playing with his necklace while I was going to the bathroom the other day, all of the beads fell of and most are still on the floor in the hall. Sigh.

Also, "bead" is now added to his repertoire of words.

How to Make Six-Pointed Snowflakes

I have a confession. I am a little prideful about my snowflake making abilities. I make pretty awesome snowflakes. But here's another confession; anybody can make them. They're SUPER easy.
So I thought I'd share a quick tutorial. There are probably hundreds of these tutorials online, but, oh well, here's one more.

Start with a piece of white paper and scissors.

 The paper needs to be square in order for these to work, so with a regular piece of 81/2"x11" you need to start by making it square. Do this by folding one corner up to meet the other side. Cut along the edge.

 Leave the square folded in half in an isosceles triangle.

Now comes the trickiest part. You're going to fold the right corner up toward and past the center. Then do the same thing with the left corner. You want all of the side to meet up and a perfect point, so this takes a bit of trial and error.

Right side

Left Side

All edges line up.

Good point.

Edges don't meet. Needs fixing.

Bad point. Needs fixing.

 Once you've got all of you're edges lined up and a nice point, you're going to fold the whole thing in half.

It really doesn't matter which way you fold here, as long as you fold in half.

Now that you're done folding, you can start cutting. It's important to notice the difference in the two sides before you cut.

The side shown above, that is closed, while make the points of the snowflake.

The other side, pictured above, the open side, will create the space between the points. I usually start by cutting into the open side.

So you can see here, the left side will be the point.

 Now it's up to you. The more space you create by cutting, the lacier and more delicate your snowflake will be.

Cutting into both sides as pictured above, will create a snowflake like the one below.

Cutting into to only the open side, like the picture above, will create a snowflake like the one below.

Be sure to cut off the tip also. This creates the hole in the middle of the snowflake. You'll find that different kind of cuts here create different shapes in the middle.

I love the way the house looks when the sun shines through the windows. Snowflake shadows everywhere!