The Chocolate Muffin Tree

Revisiting Creating Bubble Prints

2014-05-31T15:31:00.001-04:00

Creating Bubble prints is a great outdoor or rainy day activity. We first made these 3 years ago and it continues to be The Chocolate Muffin Tree's most popular post of all time. It is quite addicting! Here's how to create them:

First you need some water, tempera paint, and dish soap.

Mix about a 1/2 cup of water, 2 Tablespoons of paint, and a few squirts of dish soap in each container. We experimented and added a little more dish soap if needed! My daughter thought it was fun and enjoyed the mixing part.

Then add a straw to each container and make sure you blow into the mixture. It is like blowing bubbles in your milk or juice. She LOVED this part a lot! It was an excuse to do something that she usually is told not to do.

Once you have a huge bubble foam on the top of the container you are ready to lay a paper on top to print the bubbles. The bubbles will "POP" and create a print.

Here is our best bubble print.... we made lots and lots.

I made the bubble prints into cards. They look so pretty and friends and family members are always amazed with how they were created. This technique would create Great wrapping paper too.

Now back to blowing bubbles and trying to catch them.

Have FUN Exploring Bubbles

What is your favorite bubble activity?

This Post is Linked to:

NO TIME FOR FLASHCARDS
CRAFT SCHOOLING SUNDAY
MADE BY LITTLE HANDS MONDAY
SHOW AND TELL
PRESCHOOL CORNER
RESOURCE CENTRE
SHARING MONDAY

Glitter Liquid Watercolor Dyed Eggs

2014-04-03T21:32:00.000-04:00

We love dyeing eggs! We are joining in on Tinkerlab's Creative Challenge: Eggs. Our idea is dyeing eggs with Glitter Liquid Watercolors. We received a fabulous set of these beauties from Discount School Supply. This has got be one of my top favorite products from them. You can check out their website here, if you want to purchase some. Keep reading to find out how we created these Gorgeous dyed eggs!

To create Glitter Liquid Watercolor Dyed Eggs you'll need:

Hardboiled White Eggs

Glitter Liquid Watercolors from Discount School Supply

Eye or Medicine Droppers

muffin tin

Bowls

Coffee filters or paper towels

Newspaper

rack to set eggs on

First, grab some Glitter Liquid Watercolors from Discountschoolsupply.com and put some in containers or a muffin tin. A muffin is a great way to divide up the colors.

Place a couple of coffee filters inside a bowl or some paper towels to soak up the excess watercolors. Then place the egg or eggs on top of the coffee filter and start dripping glitter watercolors over the eggs. This is truly an engaging process to watch the colors flow over the egg and mix together.

Drip as much color as you want and then place the eggs on a baking rack with paper towels underneath to dry. I love the sparkle of the eggs with the Glitter Liquid Watercolors. Kids of all ages could easily do this process.

Have FUN!

Check out more cool egg ideas at Tinkerlab.com

Making Origami Paper Boats

2014-03-17T23:10:00.003-04:00

We had so much fun making Paper Boats the other weekend. My daughter then continued to make them all week long. She tends to find an idea like this and is so proud that she can make it and wants to show off to friends and family. We got the idea from the book: Curious George Rides a Bikeby H.L. Rey which has the instructions on how to create a paper boat within the story. This activity is great because it ties in reading and art together.

To create a paper boat you'll need:
Origami Paperor thin paper that is easy to fold

Here are the instructions we followed within the book. It begins with the paper hat. Here are instructions for the origami paper boat here at: http://www.origami-fun.com/origami-boat.html

We had so much fun with these!

We even did some floating experiments with the origami boats we made too.

Available at Amazon.com if you click on the icons below:

Making Mandalas With Stamps

2014-03-11T19:44:00.005-04:00

Do you have lots of pre-made stamps on hand? Well, I have the project for you. Normally we just stamp on papers without any direction, but recently we came up with the idea of creating mandalas or radial designs with all of our stamps. They turned out quite beautiful!

To create Mandalas with stamps all you need:

Stamps of all shapes and sizes

Ink Pads

paper in different colors

your imagination

Now, just start in the middle of the paper and create circles of stamps around your first circle. Basically, you create a target design of stamps. Here is a simple stamp mandala.

Get more detailed as you do more. Try making some stamps closer or further apart. You may even choose to overlap stamps too.

The more stamps and colors the better.

HAVE FUN!

How to Make an Abstract Kandinsky Painting

2014-03-02T18:44:00.002-05:00

My daughter was telling me about an art project that she did at school. She explained a little bit, and right away I guessed she was doing a painting project in the style of abstract painter Wassily Kandinsky. I asked her if she would show me how to create this project. She was super excited about it and being a former elementary art teacher it excited me too. Keep reading to find out how to create a Gorgeous Kandinsky look-alike painting.

Materials Needed:

white rectangular paper (we used 12x18 white paper)

tempera paint in the primary colors (red, yellow, blue)

brushes/water

mixing tray (we used paper plates)

oil pastels/or chalk

First you fold your paper into 8 sections. (C told me the teacher did it for her)

Then you start with a dot in the middle of the rectangle spaces and paint around the dot in different colors until you fill up the space. My daughter told me that the idea was to mix colors with the primary colors. She absolutely loved the idea of mixing colors just like when we did our Egg Carton Paintings here.

Here are our finished Kandinsky paintings. We added oil pastel over our paintings after they were dry.

Here is Squares and Concentric Circles by Wassily Kandinsky made in 1913. How do you think our paintings compare?

****Our Egg Carton Paintings:http://thechocolatemuffintree.blogspot.com/2012/04/egg-carton-paintings.html

Snow Art Like Simon Beck

2014-02-23T23:49:00.001-05:00

I've always admired snow artist Simon Beck ever since I read about him a few years ago. Whenever the snow falls and leaves a fresh coat of snow he is always on my mind. Simon Beck creates amazingly intricate snow art by walking with snow shoes and then later photographing his work. You can read more about him here. (And see his amazing work too!)

We tried our hand at some Snow Art after a recent snowfall.... Mostly using sticks and our fingers.

This was our stomping, which you can't get a great overview shot of, but still cool. We've created hearts and words by stomping in the snow too.

We also enjoyed creating some tiny snowmen and adding scenery with tree branches.

If there is no snow where you are, why not try mud or sand art? Artists use what is around them to create their work.

Deconstruct a Camera

2014-02-02T17:50:00.001-05:00

I had forgot we had done this and my daughter reminded me about it recently: "Hey, Mom remember when we took apart the camera?" It is always amazing when your child references back to something you hoped would be a memorable experience. It was. A lot of the things that we have done on The Chocolate Muffin Tree have proved that when we do things with our children they remember whether it is reading to them, sitting with them, listening to them, or whatever. We took apart a camera...a broken camera. It was a very sad day that this Canon Powershot fell into the salty oceans of Maui, but the vacation was fantastic! Once a camera falls into the ocean it will soak up all the salt water and salt does damage, but the memory card was fine which had all our great memories so at least those were not lost. As time went on I thought about how it would be cool to deconstruct this camera and see all the parts that made up this Digital camera.

So with the loss of my camera we gained a new experience to put under our belts. Here is the camera before:

We gathered some simple tiny screwdrivers and other tools that might help a long the way. It was a lot harder than I thought it would be. I had to recruit my dear husband to help with this process. Be careful if you ever end up doing this because my husband shocked himself when he had to detach the flash reserve....ouch! (just a little shock) The shock was not really painful, just surprising because he didn't see it coming. So with anything you decide to deconstruct....be cautious! Here are the parts and pieces again. Amazing to see all the pieces.

Why would you want to do this? Why not? By taking things apart you are learning about what makes up something. Also, if you are able to put it together (we did not!) you are learning all about construction and how things work. Ironically, my Fathers favorite thing to do is put things together. Give him a broken item or something in pieces and he will be so happy. By doing this, you may be appealing to a whole side of a child you never knew. Happy Deconstructing!

Heart Shaped Pretzels

2014-01-29T22:06:00.001-05:00

We wanted to make pretzels the other day and they managed to become Heart shapes along with other shapes and letters. These pretzels would be perfect for a Valentine's day treat or just to say I love you. This recipe is one my daughter did in school so it is a very doable process to get your kids involved. Keep reading to find out how we made Our Heart Shaped Pretzels.

Ingredients Needed for Pretzels:
1 Package Yeast
4 cups of flour
2 cups warm water
1 egg white
1 TBS. Sugar
1 + TBS Salt
Cookie sheets
Foil

-In a big bowl, mix together, yeast, water, sugar, and salt.

-Stir in flour.

-Knead dough on floured table until dough is smooth. Add more flour if too sticky.

-Line cookie sheets with foil and spray with oil.

-Shape dough into Hearts or whatever shape you choose. We did letters too.

-Brush pretzels with egg white and sprinkle with salt

****For Cinnamon Variety, brush with melted butter and sprinkle with cinnamon and sugar.

-Bake in oven set at 425 F for 15 minutes or until browned.

-Enjoy!

As you can see we made some of the pretzels into letter shapes and traditional pretzel shapes.

These are really YUMMY!
(We've been nibbling on them all week for breakfast and for treats!)

Celery Printed Rose Wrapping Paper

2014-01-28T22:11:00.002-05:00

In my last post we created Celery Printed Rose Valentines and they turned out really beautiful. The process is based on using the cut off bottom of celery to print with and create a rose shape. The natural progression was to create wrapping paper next. So that is what we did. We used large sheets of tissue paper for printing on instead of paper. This is how they turned out:

Here are the celery bottoms dipped in paint that we used for printing. Check out the post here to find out how our Valentines turned out.

Here is more of our Celery Rose Printed Wrapping Paper. We put one of the Valentines on top for a gift tag for decoration. This project is a great lesson on teaching kids about all the different ways you can use one idea.

We experimented with using larger bottoms of celery too. I loved how they looked and tried them on wrapping paper with great results too.

Happy Printing!

Celery Printed Rose Valentines

2014-01-26T12:42:00.003-05:00

We made printed roses from the bottom ends of celery stalks. I think these turned out so lovely. I've been wanting to try this for ages and finally did. Keep reading to see how we made these Celery Rose Printed Valentines.

To Create Roses from Celery you'll need:

Bottom ends of celery stalk cut off

Dish or paper plate for paint

Red, Pink, and Green tempera paint

Pink and White Construction Paper (any color you choose!)

scissors

First cut off the bottom ends of celery stalks as straight as you can to make a good printing surface. We only had small stalks, but you could use larger stalks for bigger roses too.

Prepare your paper, cut hearts, use folded paper to create cards, or use plain paper too.

Get your paint ready on a paper plate or dish and smooth out to print more easily.

Then print however you like. I like the more random look to create overlapping rose shapes.

We added other cut out hearts to frame and accent the hears. You can also use green paint for leaf accents on the roses too.

I think we'll be doing more of these. Please share your results with this process.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Science Experiment: Borax Crystal Hearts

2014-01-09T23:19:00.000-05:00

This is fun experiment with very cool results. Our inspiration was from The Scientific Mom. She created Borax Crystal Ornaments as part of her 12 Days of Science Series with her daughter. Be sure to check out her blog here to find out about all the amazing excursions and experiments that she does with her daughter. We decided to make borax crystal hearts for Valentine's day and a few snowflakes for Winter. Keep reading to find out how we made these.

To make Borax Crystal Hearts You'll Need:

Pipe Cleaners

20 Mule Team Borax (found in the laundry section of the grocery store) (5-6 Tablespoons or more)
***Borax is not-edible and should be handled with care when using with children)

Water (2 Cups or so)

Jar or Glass Container

Pencil or stick

The first step in making these is to shape a pipe cleaner into a the shape you desire. Make sure to form a hanger or add one to the shape using the pipe cleaner. Then boil about 2 cups of water (depends on how big your glass container is), let cool a little and pour into your glass container. Then, take about 6 Tablespoons of Borax and stir into the water until dissolved. Then hang your pipe cleaner shape from a pencil. Place the pencil on top of the glass container. Make sure it is submerged.

You can add more Borax which will create more crystals. Let this sit over night, and the next morning you'll have beautiful crystal shapes. ***Keep the pipe cleaner submerged over night! It was fun to experiment and check them the next morning. Here are some of our results:

Close-up Crystals

Red Metallic Heart

Silver Pipe Cleaner Snowflake

Swirls

We had a lot of fun experimenting with this idea. We tried adding food color, but the colorful pipe cleaners really brought out the color too. Have fun with this experiment and let me know your results!

New Year's Welcome Banner

2013-12-31T15:34:00.001-05:00

Are you excited for the New Year and what it will bring? I hope it brings great things to all of you! What better way to welcome 2014 with a New Year's painted banner! Such an easy project that could be scaled down or made larger for your situation.

All you need for this project:

A large or small paper/poster board

pencil

tempera paint

brushes or fingers!

glitter

any other material you choose

First begin by penciling in a "2014"or whatever year you are welcoming in. An older child could do this themselves. You can use poster board for a large sign or small paper.

Then begin painting. We started with brushes but preferred using our fingers so it became a finger painting. We added sparkly glitter into the wet paint instead of using glue later. Lastly, we added black outlining, but you could leave it without that too.

Happy New Year!

Super Easy Rocky Road Fudge

2013-12-22T22:16:00.000-05:00

Here is another amazingly easy fudge recipe I'm excited to share. Every year I make this Rocky Road Fudge for friends and family and everyone absolutely loves it! When placed in a fancy treat bag or cute tin it makes it even more extra special. Your friends and family will think you've spent hours in front of a hot stove when you've only spent under 5 minutes. Really? So give it a try. If you love this recipe, be sure to try our Super Easy Peanut Butter Chocolate Fudge recipe here.

Here is the recipe:

Super Easy Rocky Road Fudge

Ingredients:

2 cups semi-sweet Chocolate Chips

1 14 oz. can sweetened condensed milk

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

3 cups miniature marshmallows

1 1/2 coarsely chopped walnuts

1. Combine milk and chocolate chips in a large microwave bowl and stir.

2. Cook for 1 minute in microwave.

3. Add vanilla and cook for 3 minutes.

4. Now add marshmallows and walnuts and stir.

5. Press into a greased, foiled lined 13x9 inch baking pan. Chill until ready.

6. Cut into squares and serve.

7. Enjoy!

Super Easy Peanut Butter Chocolate Fudge

2013-12-15T22:38:00.000-05:00

I've made this recipe for years and it is so ridiculously easy to make! Total preparation and cooking time is probably under 5 minutes. The long part is waiting for the fudge to harden in the refrigerator. So if you need a quick treat for gifts or a dessert this recipe will do the trick. Everyone will think you took hours to make this... (everyone thinks I have every time!)

Here is the recipe:

Super Easy Peanut Butter Chocolate Fudge

Ingredients:

1 oz. unsweetened Chocolate

1 14 oz can sweetened condensed milk

2 cup peanut butter chips

1 cup peanuts

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1. Combine, chocolate, milk, and peanut butter chips in a microwave dish and stir

2. Cook 1 minute in the microwave or till smooth.

3. Stir in peanuts and vanilla.

4. Cook for 3 minutes in the microwave.

5. Stir again until smooth and pour into a 8 x 8 pan and chill.

6. Cut into squares.

7. Put in fancy containers or bags to create a special gift of the sweet people in your life.

8. Enjoy!

New Christmas Book: The Legend of Tommy The Tiny Christmas Tree

2013-12-09T20:56:00.001-05:00

I'm excited to share with you a new book that I have been involved with that features one of my Christmas Art Activities at the end!!! The book that I am proud to present is a special Christmas story called: Tommy The Tiny Christmas Tree by Sidney Louis Fleishman and illustrated by Jeanne Carr.

It is about Tommy, a little tree that stands alone wishing to become a Christmas Tree. After many years, it seems hopeless, as though he will never get his wish. Until one day, an unusual visitor comes to the forest. Will the visitor be able to grant Tommy's wish? A tale of wonder for children of all ages.

The story and illustrations in this book are delightful. Here is just a sampling of some pages of the book:

If you are looking for a new Christmas book to add to your library, The Legend of Tommy The Tiny Christmas Tree will definitely fill that space. This book would make a great gift for the children or teachers in your life. You can purchase the hard copy of this book here for $14.99. You can also purchase the book in E-book form on Amazon.com here for $3.49. Hope you enjoy the book as much as my daughter and I have.

This book is a special book because it is produced by Lucky Missy Publishing, a start up publishing company with the belief that Magic Happens when amazing talents emerge! The founder, Michelle Scotton believes that a team should be fully involved when creating a book. Many times when a book is created many people are working on it, but not collaboratively. This book was created by a team who truly had synergy and excitement through and through.

Review: Roylco Straws and Connectors Building Set

2013-11-16T22:09:00.000-05:00

Roylco sent us an amazing toy a few weeks ago: Straws and Connectors, and we absolutely loved it. Right away my daughter got constructing as you can see below. It is wonderful for fine motor control and is recommended for ages 4 and up.

The set comes with 400 total pieces of straws and connectors shown here. So colorful and appealing to children (an adults like me!).

My seven year old daughter decided to build a huge building structure and then put blankets and pillows within it. It stayed in our living room for over a week and it became a structure for imaginary play. This toy can be easily deconstructed and put away, so it doesn't take up much room when not in use. In the instruction booklet there were many examples of endless possibilities for creative building such as making rockets, cars, spheres, and so much more.

Roylco is an educational supply company with so many great resources for teachers and parents. They have endless products to purchase for Art, Crafts, Science, Math, Toys, Multicultural, Language, and so much more. Check out heir website here: Roylco.com. I know that you will find something that would be valuable for your children and their learning.

Dixon Ticonderoga School and Art Supply Review

2013-11-02T21:55:00.003-04:00

Dixon Ticonderoga sent us some wonderful art and school supplies to try out a few months ago and we have truly enjoyed their products these last few months. Having tried these products has also influenced me to order their art supplies for my High School Art classroom too. Keep reading to find out more.

When we first received these products my daughter C got right to work on a watercolor painting using Prang's fabulous 8 color set Oval pan watercolor set. These are the BEST watercolors and I have even bought them for my High School Art students. The colors are much more vibrant and rich compared to competitor brands. The nice thing about these watercolors are that you can replace the colors without having to buy a whole new set. As a teacher, it is really a money saver to be able to replace colors and not have to throw away the rest of the watercolor set.

My daughter also added Prang Markers to her masterpiece pictured here. She loved these markers and the advantage is that you can leave the caps off these markers and they do not dry out unlike competitor brands!!!

Here are some wonderful Watercolor paintings done by my High School Students using Prang Watercolors. I will definitely continue buying this brand for my students. I highly recommend them as an Art Teacher.

Another GORGEOUS painting!

I truly LOVE Ticonderoga Number 2 Pencils too. They say on the package that they are The World's BEST Pencil and I can honestly say that I agree with that statement!!!! They write so smoothly, are already sharpened, and stay intact. Other competitor pencils tend to break, are difficult to sharpen, and just do not give the same quality writing experience. My husband even stole the package of these pencils and brought them to work and I was so angry and told him to bring them back!!!! I missed them dearly. I will never buy any other pencil brand after trying these. Please try them and you will see...

We truly enjoyed these Dixon Ticonderoga Products and hope you try them soon! Visit their Website here to view other great products too.

What We've Been Doing The Past Month...(and we are on Instagram!)

2013-10-13T14:01:00.002-04:00

Sorry I haven't posted in a long time. I have been super busy with the beginning of the school year teaching High School Art and with life. I've been posting on Facebook and I'm now on Instagram if you want to follow me there. Here are some of the things we've been doing: painting bird feeders, making blueberry waffles (and chocolate chip too), starting first grade, making apple pancakes, riding bikes and playing with shadows, visiting the galleries of Artist Don Drumm, playing with Grandfather's toy train, practicing Taekwondo and earning a yellow belt!, chalking sight words and hopping on them, making corn dolls, admiring flowers, making zucchini bread, playing with vintage Bristle Blocks, playing with Magna-Tiles, Playing String Games, playing with Bloonies, deconstructing my camera that fell in the ocean, riding our plasma car, drawing trees, writing stories, making buckeye land art and so much more.....

I miss posting here and hope to write some official posts when things slow down....will they ever?

Leave your Instagram handle in the comment section below and I will follow you back...

Take care!!!

Recycled Box Puppets

2013-08-07T10:11:00.000-04:00

Again, we've been looking at old posts and noticed my collection: 18 Creative Ideas for Making Puppets. C wanted to make #2 the Box Puppets so that is what we made. There are so many great ideas on this list so please check it out if you need a puppet idea!

Materials Needed:

Small Box (we used a granola bar or fruit snack box)

scissors

glue

colored paper

craft supplies to design (eyes,pipe cleaners....)

First, tape or glue the box shut on the opening. Draw with a marker along the middle of the closed box and lead over to each side and not the bottom. This will be a guideline of where to cut.

Now, carefully cut along the line that you just drew. Open it up and bend the the part that is not cut. Your fingers and thumb will go in the openings created on each side to make the box talk.

Then cover the box with colored construction paper or with any paper you have on hand. We used the box to trace around on construction paper to create the same size paper to glue on the box.

After you have the paper glued on the box, you are ready to add eyes, antenna, hair, or whatever you choose.

Happy puppet making!

Simple Straw Noisemakers

2013-07-29T13:10:00.000-04:00

These are so unbelievably easy to make and with few supplies. We found this idea here from ScienceBob.com. I didn't even think my daughter would think this was that great, but it turned out to be a hit. One never knows with kids, so with my experience I would say to just try things even if you think it won't have success. These straw noisemakers are something you'll want to bring outside.

Supplies Needed:

plastic soda straws

scissors

First flatten out one end of the straw on the edge of the table. On the same end cut the straw to a point (as shown below). Experiment with different cuts and lengths!

Then flatten it a little more and then blow on the pointed end of the straw. Blow closer to the end where the point is for best results. ScienceBob.com describes it as a duck call noise that it makes. You may need bigger lungs, so an adult may be able to do it easier.

Try cutting the straw into different sizes for different sounds. Experiment! The science behind this is that the the two ends cut at points vibrate very fast to create a sound.

Making and Playing With Slime

2013-07-05T09:25:00.002-04:00

I cannot believe we never tried this until now.....so worth the wait though. Find out how we created this slimey Fun. The pictures speak for themselves.

To create stretchy and oozing slime all you need is:

Slime

(2 Recipes for Slime found here in my last post)

a strainer, colander, sieve, or anything with holes in it (we used a tennis racket!)

Basically all you do to create this AWESOME experiment is to place the slime on top of the item with holes and let it slowly ooze out. You could hang a strainer up high or we placed a tennis racket on top of two kid stools on either side. Then let the slime do its trick. I walked away for a minute or two and my daughter came yelling, "Come quick.....NOW!" This was ultimate excitement!

Looks like a brain.

SO Slimy and FUN.....

Hope you try this....do not wait as long as we did!

Patriotic Coffee Filters

2013-07-04T10:15:00.001-04:00

Happy 4th of July! This is a simple project to go along with the Summer holidays. They can either become a garland or become stand alone festive paintings. We got the idea from katydidandkid.com here.

All you Need:

White Coffee Filters

Tempera Paint

Paint Brushes

String/yarn
glue
newspaper

Paint your coffee filters. Make sure to lay down newspaper because the coffee filters bleed through. Let them dry.

Then either keep them as is, maybe create patriotic flowers, or string them up into a bunting or garland! All we did was fold them in half and glue them on to string.

Happy 4th of July!

Making Two Kinds of Slime

2013-07-03T00:49:00.000-04:00

As I said in my last post, we've been reminiscing about old projects, experiments, and recipes in my blog books from Blog2print. This time my daughter wanted to make slime again after seeing the post here. Not only did we make that kind of slime, but we also made a different kind of slime too. Keep reading to find out the 2 types of slime we made.

Recipe #1 Slime:

Mix in one bowl:
3/4 cup warm water
1 cup white glue
few drops of food coloring

Mix in a second bowl:
1 1/3 cups warm water
4 teaspoons Borax
(Borax is found in the laundry section. ****Borax should not be ingested and can cause skin reactions with some... so use your discretion!)

Pour contents of first bowl into second bowl and let sit for one minute without stirring. Then explore Slime #1!

Recipe #2 Slime:
1/4 cup water
1/4 cup white glue
1/4 cup liquid starch
few drops of food coloring

Pour all glue in mixing bowl and then add water. Stir water and glue together. Add food color. Then lastly add starch. Then have fun with Slime #2.

Making the two kinds of Slime was fun in itself and this time my daughter could actually read the recipe, so making it a great reading activity and science experiment too.

We compared and contrasted the two kinds of Slime as we were playing with them: Slime #1 was
more rubbery and Slime #2 was smoother and more squooshy.

Then very soon after, both slimes were mixed together....which ended all comparisons. (But it did prove that yellow-green and blue make green!) Plastic bugs made a great companion for the slime play.

C covered the bugs with slime, tore it into tiny pieces, stretched it, and pressed bugs into it to make impressions. Slime makes for such creative and FUN play with endless possibilities.

Hope you are inspired to try out both recipes for Slime.

Do you know any other recipes for Slime?

Simple Origami Butterflies Revisited

2013-06-30T09:24:00.003-04:00

I had out my hard bound book copies of my blog recently and my daughter and I were reminiscing about all the projects we have done and how much they were enjoyed. It sure made my heart feel good!
If you are a Blogger and want a great way to preserve your blog without any fuss go to Blog2print and you will not be disappointed. Here is C enjoying the blog books.....there is something to be said about turning the pages and holding a book as compared to a website. I am so glad I have preserved these memories in physical form.

My daughter was so enamored with all the pages and pages of projects from my blog, but she finally stopped at our Origami Butterflies that we did back in 2011 and she was hooked once again.

Here is just a sampling of the butterflies she made. If you want to check out how to create these Origami Butterflies, the post is here. The post has a great step by step tutorial.

We made an Origami Butterfly Garland too. C even made more butterflies the next day.

I have a feeling we'll be recreating more and more projects from past posts!

Puffy Paint Plastic Lid Sun Catcher

2013-06-20T08:07:00.001-04:00

We've made about a zillion sun catchers and this just adds to our list. I think this will be a favorite among them all. These were made purely by chance and those always seem to be the best projects. My daughter C had an art kit with puffy paint and there was quite a bit left so we decided to use our always abundant supply of plastic lids to create these wonderful sun catchers.

Materials Needed:

Clear Plastic Lids
Puffy Paint
String for hanging

You can purchase dimensional puffy paint at amazon.com or any craft store and is usually labeled as "fabric paint". We gathered our clear plastic lids on white paper so we could see the paint better on our dark colored table. Then after this, simply design what you would like on your plastic lids. We chose radial designs or circular designs which go very well with the lid shape. Next, let the paint dry overnight, punch holes for string, attach string, and hang on your window. Enjoy the Sun and beautiful Art....