Biggie Fuse Beads

I bought a bucket of these a couple of months ago and put them out on M’s shelves as a fine motor activity.  He is crazy about them!  We also bought the set of two clear plastic pegboards, and he places the beads on the little pegs.  Once he’s made  a design he likes, I iron it for him (with the included ironing paper) and they melt together.  I’m sure most of you have seen the mini version of this for older kids, but the Biggie version is a great way to start those little fingers out!

At first M made his own designs, like these:Going clockwise from the top – a square, ,a wagon, a truck, and dragon bones. :)

But just recently he became interested in using the patterns that came with the peg boards.  Then we found more patterns for them here, which was very exciting, and I was told to print them all out. :)  *Note: the patterns for Biggie Beads start at the bottom of the page that I’ve linked to. 

His collection so far:Honestly, I think that photo shows only part of what he’s made; we’ve gone through 2 buckets so far, but I’m not sure where he’s hoarding the rest of his creations.

This has ended up being a fantastic activity for him – it works those fine motor muscles in his hand, works on the all-important tripod grasp, has helped him develop some patience and perseverance as he sees each pattern to the end, matching up the beads just right to the pattern.  It has expanded his attention span also, and gives him a good sense of accomplishment and pride in a job completed.  Wow – all that from a bucket of beads! :) 

M will be 4 soon, and once we finish up our most recent bucket of Biggie Beads, I’ll see how he does with the smaller version. 

Is there a product out there that you and your child have fallen in love with?  Share it in the comments – I would love to find more great products like this!

Have a beautiful day! :)

Firefly Flashlight Craft!

This was a really fun little craft to make, and the second bug craft we did… M agreed to it (despite the craft strike) because a flashlight is involved.  Flashlights have batteries and anything with a battery is a sure thing with this kid. 

You will need:
A flashlight (find one that has a cord looped through it, or a key ring or something, as this is where you’ll attach the antennae), pipe cleaner, construction paper, marker, scissors, googley eyes, glitter (if you dare), a small container for the glitter (if you dare), and glue.  I ended up hot gluing the eyes onto our firefly to speed things up, although I think if someone had been patient enough for it to dry, regular white glue would have worked.

To begin, I folded our construction paper in half lengthwise and drew a half oval (roughly):

M cut it out and unfolded it to see the oval:

Apply glue in a pretty design all over your oval, which will be the wings: 

I dumped our little pack of gold glitter into a small applesauce container, and M used his fingers to pinch it and sprinkle it onto his firefly’s wings:

While the wings are drying, remove the cord (or key ring, or whatever) from your flashlight, and thread the pipe cleaner through.  Twist it a couple of times so it won’t slip, then twist up the ends of the antennae:

That is not a very clear photo of this step, so here’s a close up of what it should look like at this point:

Put a line of glue down the center of the flashlight and attach to the center fold on the wings, then glue on the eyes:

Finished!  Let it dry, and play with your new firefly!
This would be pretty with lots of different colors for the glitter, don’t you think?  This mama was only brave enough to use one color this time. :)

Have a beautiful day! :)

Click Beetle Craft… and he flips!

There are about 1000 awesome bug crafts that I’ve come across online in the past few weeks, and of course M has decided to go on another craft strike.   Oh, that kid.  He said to me, “I like to do art, but only when I can do my own thing!” 

He is throwing my own philosophy of art (for small children) back in my face, isn’t he?  Apparently, he doesn’t understand that crafts are cute and if Mama wants to do one, philosophy can fly out the window.  ;)

Ah well, of the many buggy crafts I was hoping to do, only two of them were interesting enough for him to agree to.  The first is this click beetle that I’ve seen around quite a bit, but think I first found at Prekinders.

You will need:Fun foam or cardstock, glue, a spring-type clothespin, googley eyes, a pom pom, dot stickers, a marker, and scissors.

I drew two wings on the fun foam and M cut them out:


Next, he decorated them with the dot stickers.  If you use cardstock instead, you could use dot painters for this part; I’m not sure how the painters would work on the foam.

Glue the upper corners of the wings onto the clothespin, like this, kind of:

Glue on the pom pom head, then add the eyes onto the pom pom.

Finished!  And isn’t the little guy cute?  The best part is this – after the glue has dried, press down on his tail (the end of the clothespin), let go, and he will flip or jump for you, making a satisfying “click” sound at the same time. :)

Note: if we do this again, I’d use cardstock instead of the fun foam.  The wings have to overlap a bit and when we used regular white glue the top wing didn’t stay put very well.  I ended up hot gluing it on.

Have a beautiful day! :)

Bird Craft #3 – Birdhouse Suncatcher

A few weeks ago M used some of his Art Box materials to paint and glue 5 craft sticks (popsicle sticks) into a house shape.  I wasn’t sure what to do with it, but when we started learning about birds, it came to me – it was a perfect birdhouse shape!

Here’s what he used to make the 1st part of his suncatcher:

• 5 Craft sticks, painted, and glued into a house shape
• contact paper cut to fit the house
• tissue paper torn into random pieces
• glue
• a green strip of paper (about 2 1/2 inches wide), with “grass” lines marked along the length of it, going about 3/4 of the way up
• one circle cut from black paper

I took the backing off of the contact paper and M began sticking the tissue paper pieces onto it:
Next, he cut along the lines of the green paper to make grass (yes, I know birdhouses don’t normally sit in the grass, but it seemed like a nice touch.  And he got to practice those scissor skills.) :
We put a line of glue on the back of the craft sticks and glued the contact paper onto it, then glued the grass onto the front, and glued the black circle onto the middle to make the opening:
I trimmed the excess tissue paper off and we popped it onto the window:
Pretty, no?  But we thought  a little birdie might be nice too, so we got more contact paper and more tissue paper and made a little bird using M’s handprints.  I forgot to take a photo of the process, but here’s M showing you how to put your hands together to make a bird:
I traced his hands onto contact paper and cut the bird shape out for him.  After he covered it with tissue paper I added another piece of contact paper over the top and trimmed it up.
I drew a little birdie face on it:
And we glued it to the front of his birdhouse:
I love how it turned out – it’s really much prettier than the picture shows!

Have a beautiful day! :)

Bird Craft #2 – Paper Bag Bird’s Nest

This is what M woke up to see on the table Tuesday morning:Supplies: brown paper lunch bag, glue, crayons or markers, yarn, feathers, anything interesting to line your nest with (you could add in some dried grass and twigs too!).
To make the nest, I rolled the paper bag inward all the way down.  M was dying to do this part, but it can be tricky to get it started; eventually it ends up looking like this:
Then it was time to decorate the nest.  M started off using crayons, but they were hard to manage on something so crumpled.  He switched to markers, which worked much better.
Next he began gluing in the all the fun stuff to make the nest nice and soft:
Look!  A cozy little nest!
Perfect for a little mama-made birdie. :)  M was surprised and thrilled to see this little bird and her eggs waiting to go in the nest a little later. :) 

This was a fun craft project for M, I only added in the little bird because I wanted to give him something special to keep.  He is all about birds right now… even to the point of standing at the window at bedtime saying, “I can’t go to bed, I’m listening to the chickadees and cardinals!” :)  Evidently he is not above using the sweet little birds as stall tactics (and he knows Mama gets excited when he uses the correct names).   It would be fun to do this and use large pom-poms to make birds for the nest.

Have a beautiful day! :)

Bird Craft #1

One of our little bird-themed activities was this shapes bird craft.  I cut out a few shapes (large oval, circle, heart, triangle, 2 tiny rectangles), and had them waiting on the table for M one morning.  I quickly drew a picture for him to use as a guide, and added some foam stickers, a googley eye, and some decorating options (watercolor pencils, watercolor paints, glitter glue).


You know once he saw the glitter glue he was all over this, right?  :)  Mmmm… sparkly…

As he put his little bird together I guided him by naming a shape for him to pick out, asking him where that shape was on the picture I had drawn, and then talking about that particular part of the bird.  This was a more mama-led activity than most of our crafts, but I wanted a little shape reviewing, and I used it to talk about the parts of a bird.  They have wings, not arms; a beak or bill instead of a nose and mouth; feathers  instead of bare skin or fur, etc.  I was sneaking in a little biology. ;)

After he glued everything in place the decorating began!  Of course he went straight for the glitter glue first, then used a couple of the watercolor pencils (although he did not actually paint over them with water), then used q-tips in the watercolor paints to fill in some areas. 
I just love how this little birdie turned out. :)  M named him “Easter Bird”.   He sure is a colorful one!

I made a template of the shapes we used, although it would be simple to do without them.  If you are interested you can download it here.

It would be neat to use feathers to decorate this little bird, but I. can. not. stand. feathers.  Uggh, the mess they make!  M can use feathers at Grandma’s house, hee hee.

Have a beautiful day! :)

The Art Box – March 22, 2010

 

Whew!  We are home again and slowly getting back to normal.  Our trip to visit my parents began on the 12th and we were back home on the 20th.  My apologies for not responding to emails and comments and those of you who linked up last week… we were cursed with a painfully slow internet connection all week.  I did only what was absolutely necessary online.  Hopefully I will get around to going through a very full inbox sometime this week.  We also brought home some sort of cruddy cold virus, so be patient with me! :)

M colored a lot of pictures for Nama (my mom) and made some collages too, but I just wasn’t up to getting pictures.   I did snap a shot of this cute vase he made:

And this necklace for Auntie M:

Link up your Art Box posts below!

Have a beautiful day! :)

 

Craft Time! Cardboard Tube Crocodile

Crafts are back (somewhat)… yay!  I’ve really missed doing these things with M, we just did SO much when he was younger.  I had something artsy or crafty planned every day after naptime.  Hm.  Come to think of it, I miss naptime too…
We started with a paper towel tube, a toilet paper tube, some zig-zag scissors, green paint, googley eyes, glue, and 4 feet outlined on the back of a cereal box:

Cut a slit down the side of the t.p. tube, going about halfway down.  Then wrap it around to form a point at the end and tape:

Put the long tube inside the end of the short tube and tape together:

I drew a triangle on each side of the other end of the long tube:And then helped M cut along the lines with the zig-zag scissors.  Apparently there is no after picture of this.  The zig zags make it look like crocodile teeth.
Paint it all green:

Cut out the feet, paint them green too.  Then glue on the googley eyes and let it dry for the rest of the day:(That’s an old flexible plastic cutting board that we use for messy projects.)      
Then  glue on the feet:
Look, a crocodile!  Paint the inside of his mouth red and the tiny little teeth white IF you feel up to it.  If not, leave it like ours. ;)
We actually read a book about a crocodile around the same time we did this craft – Lyle, Lyle Crocodile, by Bernard Waber.So, I think this means I can link up to the awesome stART carnival (story + art = stART) at Michelle’s wonderful blog!  Yippee!
Have a beautiful day! :)