Melted Crayon Christmas Trees (or any other shape you’d like)

I know this is not an original idea; I think many moms have tried this at one time or another.  But I thought I’d write about it because it was just so much fun for M.  I first saw the idea several years ago in MaryAnn Kohl’s book, Scribble Art. 

M has been asking to melt crayons into shapes since we made heart crayons for Valentine’s Day.  This kid grabs onto an idea and does not let it go. 

10 months later I finally gave in.  :)

Actually, the real reason we haven’t done it is that I’ve only had heart shaped muffin tins (the silicone kind).  So when I saw some cute tree-shaped ones at Target I grabbed them and one day last week I gave M the good news (you could use cookie cutters, but I felt too lazy to go to all that work, lol).  Boy, was he ever excited.  He spent a good 10 minutes at the kitchen counter going through his bucket of crayons and picking out the ones he wanted to use. 

Like this:

Yep, just hanging there like a monkey, sorting crayons.  Did I mention he was excited?  (No, he wasn’t drinking the Coke in the background, that’s just for Mama, hee hee.)

After finding a variety of colors, with a good assortment of green shades, and peeling off all the papers, it was time to break the crayons up.  M came up with the hammer idea on his own.  Putting them in a plastic baggie first was my idea. ;)

He’s hammering them into tiny pieces in the photo below.  Hammering so hard his mouth is hanging open and you can’t really see the hammer because it’s moving so fast.  This may have been his favorite part:

We pulverized the greens first, and placed a layer of them in each mold:

Then the pretty colored ones were sprinkled on top:
You want these to be sort of thick, otherwise they may break when you pry them out of the molds.  We filled our molds up just a little less than halfway.

We put them in a 150 degree oven for 15 minutes, pulled them out, and as they started to harden, I poked a straw into them to create the hole for the ribbon.  Then we put them in the fridge to finish hardening and to loosen up a bit, for another 15 minutes. 

We popped them out of the molds (all the trunks broke off, darn it), tied on ribbons, and picked out one for each grandmother:

We colored with the rest for a while, and then hung them on our Christmas tree.  Aren’t they pretty?

Honestly, this was such an easy project for me – M did almost all the work, and loved every second of it, from finding the “right” crayons, peeling the papers off, and just about everything else.  All I did was put them in the oven and take them out.  Well, I tied the ribbons too.  But really, as easy as this was, I was surprised at the amount of pure happiness it gave him.  I definitely have to find more (cheap) shaped silicone muffin pans!

Have a beautiful day! :)

 

Preschool Art / Craft – Melted Bead Christmas Ornaments

A few weeks ago, in a preschool post, I mentioned some great little suncatcher kits from Makit Bakit.  I remember making these when I was a kid, and they were so much fun.  These come in both boy and girl themes, which makes my art-loving boy very happy. 

You fill the sections of a metal suncatcher frame with the beads (I have M pinch them to transfer them to the frame – great fine motor work), then pop the whole thing into the oven for 20 minutes and they melt.  The result is a stained-glass-look suncatcher.  I think this kind is much, much prettier than the kind you paint.

a racecar M made recently 
(the black beads are not transparent,
and make it look a bit splotchy;
most kits don’t have the black beads)

Each package has more than enough plastic beads for the suncatcher that comes with it.  I’d love it if they had just packs of the beads available, but as far as I know, they don’t offer them apart from the suncatcher frames.

You know I can’t throw those extra beads away. :)  So we used them with mini cookie cutters to make ornaments.

Our extra beads: 

Line a pan with aluminum foil and place the cookie cutters on it.  Then begin filling them up with beads.  You want to have a layer that completely covers the foil at the bottom of each cookie cutter, with a small mound in the center that thins out towards the edges:

Pop them into a 375 degree oven for 15 to 20 minutes. 

You have to be quick with this next part.  As soon as they are out of the oven, they begin to cool off and get hard.  To make the hole for ribbon, I used a 1/8” dowel, coated with non-stick spray.  Stick it into the area of each ornament where you want the hole to be.  The first couple were pretty easy, then as they started to harden, I had to really twist the dowel to get it out.  I ended up putting half of the ornaments back into the oven to melt a bit and then made holes in them.

Peel the foil off the back, and pop them out of the cookie cutters.

They turned out pretty cute!

Strung onto ribbon, they’ll look so pretty on the tree or even hanging in a window.

Have a beautiful day! :)

Preschool Art - Shiny Foil Christmas Collages

 
I’m always surprised at how inspiration can strike simply by going through what we already have. 

I mentioned in an earlier post that we’ve been cleaning out and organizing some of our space in the past month or so, and part of this included my craft storage area.  As we went through a huge bin of paper products, I found some pretty Christmas cards that I had saved, in the hopes that I’d come up with something to do with them.

Most of the cards had some sort of foil or glitter or something sparkly on them.  I cut out the pretty parts, and teamed them up with some glitter snowflake stickers, and sequins, and cut some glitter Christmas shapes from foam (stockings, candy canes, triangle “trees”, circle “ornaments”, stars). 

And what shines better than aluminum foil?  So I set everything out for M one morning.  I included some window markers too and glue of course:

This was definitely one of the biggest hits we’ve had lately.  M loved this little art project, and it was so much fun I even got in on the action a bit. :)  The white window marker shows up so nicely on foil and made the perfect snow:

Eventually we realized that our window markers are in pretty bad shape and drying out.  So I brought out the window crayons (which I normally loathe, because they are such a mess to clean off of windows).  The window crayons were perfect for this (permanent markers work well on foil too) and, while you do have to be careful at first since they will smear onto anything that touches them, they do dry and are then perfectly ok.  They went onto the foil so smoothly and have such bright colors, that I think these will be our “aluminum foil crayons” and window crayons no longer. No clean up for mom that way. ;)

Finished collages:
  

This was such a blast (for me too)!  If you are looking for a quick art project without so much prep, just peel off some aluminum foil, get out those window markers and crayons, and let the kids go to work! :)

Have a beautiful day! :)

Christmas Art Project at The Homeschool Classroom

Please take a moment to read my latest post at The Homeschool Classroom, about one of our favorite Christmas art projects.  It was so much fun to make and we really love the results!

Have a beautiful day! :)

Art (and craft, sorta) Time – Homemade Gift Wrap

We had SO much fun with this little art project!  I can’t wait to wrap up Christmas gifts with this very special gift wrap. :) 

We’ve never done this before, but it’s an idea I’ve had for quite a while now.  I have an abundance of white tissue paper, and from time to time I try to think of something to do with all of it.  Well, this was a huge hit, and I think it may just become an annual tradition!

I had quite a variety of materials set up for us, but M was so eager to get started that I wasn’t able to get very good photos.  I’ll try to list all the things we used; you can make this as messy or neat as you want, depending on your supplies.  We went for messy, mainly because of the glitter.

I set out several Christmas-themed stamps – “real” stamps and some that were sponges cut into shapes (you can see the star one in the photo below).  We used red, green, and gold paint with the stamps instead of regular stamp pads (although that would be a great option!), so to keep the stamps from getting “globby” with the paint, I poured the paint directly onto scraps of felt.  I dampened the felt first, although I’m not sure that’s necessary.  The paint soaks nicely into the felt and makes a great stamp pad with clear stamp results.  I added a bit of glitter into the paint, hoping that would satisfy the glitter-obsessed boy.

I also set out a mini paint roller, and some porcupine balls.  We used the porcupine balls like stamps, and the prints looked a bit like snowflakes or stars.

I also set out the following (sorry no good pics!):

• red and green dot painters
• red and green roll-on painters
• red and green markers
• red, green, gold, and silver crayons, bundled together with rubber bands (this was fun!)
• a saucer full of school glue with glitter mixed into it. 
• glitter foam snowflakes and Christmas trees

The school glue dries clear, and I used several different colors of glitter in it.  When you paint it onto tissue paper, you get this result:It’s very shiny and sparkly!  The photo really doesn’t do it justice.

M used every last art supply I had set out and had a ton of fun making gift wrap!   

I joined in and made some myself and we had a wonderful afternoon of fun.  We ran out of room for all the pieces to dry, but thankfully it doesn’t take long for tissue paper to dry, so I simply taped pieces to the cabinets once we ran out of counter space. :)

Eventually I gave in to the request for sprinkling on glitter and after that everything was glitterized. :)

Here’s what we made… again, the photos don’t really do these justice.  If you are lucky enough to receive a gift from us wrapped up in one of these you’ll see just how pretty they really are…

I think we’ll wrap presents with brown craft paper first, so the gift isn’t visible, then finish with a layer of our homemade gift wrap.  I can’t wait to put on some pretty Christmas music and wrap some pretty presents!

Have a beautiful day! :)

Art Time – Salt Sprinkled Watercolors

I’ve been wanting to try out this watercolor technique for a long time, and finally got the chance when I had my crafty 6 year old niece over for a couple of days.  This girl is up for anything artsy or craftsy, any time of the day! :)  It must run in their genes.  These two could paint all day.

To do this, use real watercolor paper if possible. 

You will also need paintbrushes, liquid watercolors (mix a little water into tempera), and salt in a shaker.

Paint as you normally would onto the paper.  If you want, you can brush the paper with clean water before painting.  This makes the colors blend and look softer.

Once you are happy with your painting, sprinkle a generous amount of salt over the top of it and set it aside to dry.  When it is dry you can shake off the excess.

The salt creates interesting patterns on the watercolors.  It absorbs some water, leaving tiny dots of lighter color behind.  In some areas it feathers the color out in a pretty design.  And some of it sticks to the paper, making it sparkle in the light. 

I brought out the oil pastels to add another dimension to the art and showed the kids how to draw “magic” pictures with the white pastel.  See how the tiny dots left behind by the salt gave this painting another layer of texture?      

   Working hard on their artwork!

Lots of beautiful things were made!  

 

      

Make sure you have your broom nearby after this project!  The salt does seem to go everywhere.  Better yet, have a child-size broom nearby and let the kids clean up!  :)

Have a beautiful day! :)

 

P.S. A portion of this art project was taken from Preschool Art: It's the Process, Not the Product by MaryAnn Kohl.  This is a wonderful book (as I’ve mentioned many times before)!

Preschool Art Project and Craft – Coffee Filter Leaf Mobile

 
We love watercolor paints, and once in a while I like to make liquid watercolors with our regular tempera.  Simply thin the paint out with water, or use liquid starch for a shiny finish, until the paint is as watery as you want it.
 I know I’ve said this a million times… my paint palette of choice is still a muffin tin with an applesauce cup in each well!

Coffee filters, paper towels, or even loosely woven fabric (think muslin or any woven cotton) work great with liquid watercolors.  We decided to use coffee filters this time, and instead of using a pipette to drip the paints, or a paintbrush, we folded our filters up and dipped each corner into the paints.  This created a fun tie-dyed effect. 




M and his cousin S had so much fun with this that we ended up with over 30 tie-dyed coffee filters.  
What does one do with 30 tie-dyed coffee filters??
Well, thankfully I was in the middle of reading this post of Jolanthe’s, where she shared her beautiful tissue paper leaf mobile.  I stole her idea and used what we had available – colorful coffee filters. :)

We did not use all 30+ of them, so if there are any more creative ideas for these babies, let me know!

I drew a few leaves on several of the filters and cut them out.
An older child could do the drawing and cutting themselves.  I admit, this turned into a Mostly-Mama Craft, but I enjoyed it and I love the end result.

Punch a hole or use a needle and some string or yarn to thread a length of string through each leaf.  Tie them in varying lengths along a dowel rod.   I have a ton of dowel rods in my craft collection, although I’m not quite sure why.  If you don’t, you could easily use some popsicle sticks glued together or even a pipe cleaner, or get thrifty and decorate a paper towel tube to use (those things are handy to have around, aren’t they?).
 

Tie another length of string to the dowel for hanging and hang it in front of a sunny window. 

   

M loves his new leaf mobile!

Have a beautiful day! :)