Color Block Cards

My letterbox trading card obsession has provided many smallish scraps of paper.  I hate to throw them out and have been gradually filling a box with the small pieces of scrap booking paper.  Last summer, in the midst of all our chaos, there was a pin on interest about using scrap booking paper to make color block greeting cards.  It seemed such a simple solution to my increasing number of scraps.  I cut the various papers using a paper cutter to get straight edges, then tried out various designs until the result was pleasing.  The papers were simply glued to cardstock weight paper that was cut and folded to create a card. 

The project was quick and easy.  My youngest daughters helped create a few more of the cards to use for their friends.  These cards will be used as note cards, so the insides were left blank.

Easy Children's Paper Wall Art Project

My younger girls love to do crafts with me.  We've been so busy with the project house that our crafting time has disappeared.  I got an idea from pinterest for creating wall art for the younger girl's bedroom using paint chips.  We have a lot of paint chips right now and this seemed like a good use for the paint chips that we decided not to use in the project house. 

The younger girls want to have a blue bedroom with purple accents.  Actually, Allie wants a purple room and Paige wants a blue room.  This was our compromise.  We used purple and blue paint chips and a circle hole punch to create this spiral design.  I still need to make the frame, but the girls are happy to see some of their decorations coming together. 

We also used a leaf punch to make a fall design.  Fall colors make me happy, to this will get hung in the work-out room to help create a calm and happy environment.  I need as much incentive as possible to spend time working out each day!

Neither project took us very much time and the girls enjoyed spending some craft time with me on a rainy afternoon.  I enjoyed doing something relaxing with my youngest girls who are growing up much too quickly.

More Free Time on my Hands

Having one homeschooled student is fun. We accomplish everything early each day. We have time to talk, play games, clean the house, cook real meals. On the other hand, Madelyn isn't used to having or desiring her teacher's undivided attention all day. She's taken to hiding out in other rooms to do her assignments instead of sitting at the table, where I wait patiently for her to complete her work.

To give her a break and bring her back to the dining room table, I've been doing letterbox trading cards or LTCs. After providing instruction and doing a few practice problems with Madelyn, I work on trading cards while she does school. She really appreciates NOT being the center of attention and I get to be a little creative.

LTCs are 2 1/2 x 3 1/2 inch cards that are stamped with a hand-carved rubber stamp and then decorated using various craft techniques. Each LTC trading tracker consists of between 12-50 participants. Each person makes enough cards for each person signed up in the tracker. The cards are then mailed to one person, who divides them among all the participants and then mails them back.

After creating and stamping all the LTCs, I plant the stamp with a logbook for someone to find as a traditional letterbox.

These are some of the LTCs that I've made this week.

Easy Wind Socks

The kids and I are enjoying the wonderful spring weather and decided to do a craft in honor of the warm breezes. These simple wind socks only take about 20-30 minutes to make and are weather proof enough to handle gentle rain.



1. Place a rectangular piece of foam with the long side parallel to the table. Use foam stickers to decorate the foam rectangle. It's important to keep the sides empty approximately 1/2" from the short edge. If desired, foam pieces could be cut out and attached with glue. Glued on pieces to set for up to 12 hours.



2. Place Velcro adhesive dots or squares at the top, middle, and bottom of the short edges. One side of the Velcro should be placed on the decorated side of the foam, the other group of Velcro tabs should be placed on the non-decorated side.
I loosely folded the ends together to match where the Velcro tabs were placed.



3. Poke two holes opposite each other on the top of the wind sock. Cut ribbon or elastic to desired length (mine were about 10") and knot into each hole.

4. Poke 4-6 equally spaced holes in the bottom of the wind sock. Cut ribbon to desired length and attach with knots to holes.

We stapled out windsocks to our porch roof. It may be necessary to take down the wind socks in extremely windy weather.

Candy Wreaths

Several years ago, the older children and I made candy wreaths out of hard candy. It's an easy project and normally extremely successful. The candy is placed in a circle on a foil lined cookie sheet.



The edges of the candy need to touch each other.



The cookie sheets are placed in the oven at 350 degrees. In about 4-6 minutes the candy melts together for form a colorful candy wreath. After the candy cools, a ribbon bow is glued at the top and a ribbon hanger is tied through the center of the wreath. We used the Cut Rock candy, which melted into color-edged white circles with designs in the center. Eventually, the wreaths were destroyed. My littlest girls hadn't made the candy wreaths yet, so we decided to make them again this year. I searched all over town for the Cut Rock candy and couldn't find any. In desperation, I purchased several pounds of bulk hard candy to use instead.

When the kids created the first batch of wreaths, we discovered that the melting point of each type and color of candy was different. Some of the candies were still hard circles, while other candies had melted all over the place. The kids ate the first set of wreath disasters.

Today, we tried the wreaths again. The red Starlight mints melted fairly consistently.



Unfortunately, the other candies didn't work out well. The green "Starlight Mints" foamed before they melted and created another candy disaster. (Something more for the kids to eat."



We ended up with 5 fairly recognizable wreaths. Next year, we'll order the candy well in advance.

Easy Children's Craft Project: Candy Dish

My daughters made these cute candy dishes at camp, using clay flower pots and a Rose bowl. The clay flower pot and clay dish were painted, then glued together with the rose bowl. A wooden ball was glued on the top to create the gum machine lid.