a stick and wool mobile

It rained when we visited my mum in Wellington recently. I knew T would enjoy this craft as it involved wrapping sticks with lots of different coloured wool- it really is as simple as that. Once they're all done, tie them together, hang a rock or other type of weight on the end and find somewhere to hang it. We've hung ours at the front door. I like how it spins in the breeze and adds a bit of colour. Things are looking a bit dreary in the front garden right now- Winter is coming.

You can see on our mobile that it's unraveling a bit- we probably should've glued the wool ends down when we made it ( we just knotted it instead). I will fix it one day.

fairy business

I'm super excited about helping out with the fairy grotto at school fair this year and can't wait to help put it all together. An idea our 'creative director' came up with is to sell little painted stones ( with proceeds to the school). So I've been painting and glittering stones : ).

melted pastel rocks

I wanted to do an Easter craft. The idea is that you boil eggs and while they're hot decorate them with crayons as they melt on the hot shell. I couldn't find white eggs anywhere so we flagged it.

Thinking some more about it, I doubt we would've eaten them with the outside coated in wax- so maybe it was a good thing. I know the kids would've wanted to decorate more than one egg so it would've been a bit wasteful.

Anyway, from all of that I got the idea of heating up rocks in the oven ( I know, I also wonder how my mind gets to these places!...) They didn't take long to get hot and it was really fun watching the pastels melt, blend and run into each other. We used a folded tea towel with some tinfoil on top to protect the table.

I should point out that this is not a craft for young children. I had to talk to my kids at length about how hot the rocks would be and not to touch them with anything but the end of the pastel. They only used longer pastels but both got a wee bit of a fright when they got a bit close- but no burns. I'd say this is best done with 7 year olds and up.

When the rocks had cooled and the wax hardened I sprayed them with a clear polyurethane and displayed some at our front door step- a bit of bright happiness for visitors.

story stones

Our recent trip to the Rangitata river mouth meant that we could finally make some of these story stones (I've been wanting to for a while0. They're a great idea for fostering creativity, language development and thinking skills.

Using these, children associate imagination and illustrations. They're perfect for our wee man who starts school in Feburary and for our girl who are both great 'talkers'.

The idea is to pull one stone out at a time and make up a story using the images as prompts. Kids ( and parents) do this until the story reaches its natural conclusion. I have always loved storytelling. I like the idea of helping children visualize a story- instead of waiting for a tv show to do it for them!). 

My step dad read the Hobbit to me when I was 10. I still remember how my Gollum and Bilbo looked and I was fascinated when the films came out. I got to see how someone else had imagined them and how they compared to mine. I absolutely LOVE the Hobbit and Lord of the Rings films and I think this and my memories of being read to are part of the reasons why.

Here's our stones. We made up 15 with me drawing the the kids doing the painting. Nana Wellington ( my mum) has made us a few drawstring bags, one of these will be perfect to store them in.

they painted and when dry I added details

all done!

my faves, love M's ladybird and T's growly bear

stone owls

M's Friday teacher is doing an owl drawing and collage unit with them. Owls are their classroom theme Outstanding Wise Learners - pretty cute. M's been drawing owls at home since as she's remembered the steps. When I saw a friend had pinned this image I knew what we'd do with the little bag of river stones we've bought with us to our 'fixing house'.

Here's the image from pinterest:

And the source: http://www.redtedart.com/2013/06/19/stone-owls/

We did ours a little bit differently by using coloured pencils ( only because we didn't bring felts here!)

I love how M made T some step by step instructions- a 'blueprint' she called it

even numbering them- bless

This owl has very big eyes for seeing at night x

sticks and stones

We went away this weekend and a little art box went with us. There is no shortage of rocks or driftwood at the beach near where we went so I thought we might paint some of them. We ended up with brightly coloured 'magic wands' a couple of whales, a love heart, some bugs and a ladybird. We brought some home with us but others stayed there in the garden. I think the grandparents like them as they're a reminder to all that the hut really is a place for family.