Archive for February 2011
Aliens are super cool and combining a craft with pretend play is even cooler. We love dress up at our house ( and preschool) and this alien headband craft was created to use as a pretend play prop. I suggested my son glue eyes on the band but he was very adamant that they needed to be up high on antennae. Even though I have directions you can follow this is the sort of craft that is best used as inspiration for your own unique creation.
- Gather your materials. You will need some paper, paint, glue, sparkly pipe cleaners, sticky back sparkly foam, googly eyes, tape and glitter!
- Start by having your child paint the paper. This will be cut in two strips to make the headband. Tell your child you will be cutting it, this can really upset young kids if they aren’t warned. I like using either a foam paint brush or paint markers like these when we want the paint to dry fast.
- While they paint, trace a circle 6 times on the backing of the sparkly foam.
- Cut out.
- Glue the googly eyes on. Let dry.
- Next cut the paper in half.
- Add glue and glitter. You want to do it after your cut not before so that you aren’t cutting into glue and glitter. Trust me glitter is messy enough, but cleaning it out of scissors is no fun. Let dry.
- Cut your pipe cleaners into different heights.
- When eyes are dry ( or at least dry enough not to slide, peel off the backing of the 3 foam circles that do not have googly eyes on them. Press the pipe cleaners into them.
- Peel the back off the circles with eyes , press into the circles with the pipe cleaners so they are sandwiched.
- When the glitter is dry tape the pipe cleaners with eyes on the front of one strip. You will want it near the end because you are going to tape the other strip on top to sandwich them.
- Size it to your child’s noggin’ and secure the two ends with tape. I like using tape for 2 reasons. It’s forgiving and it’s fast, so kids can play right away.
Books
The Way Back Home 
Hush, Little Alien
Moon Man
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My son has been pretending he is knight for a few weeks. In all that time he’s been using a cutting board as his shield, it was high time we made him one! When we had a playdate scheduled with a friend who loves art and knights it was a done deal. Now you will notice that my directions and pictures don’t match perfectly, follow the directions because if I did this craft again I’d do a few things differently to make it easier . Oh and crafts while chatting to a girlfriend and holding a baby… just have extra things on hand in case you miss a step or 3.
- Gather your materials. You will need some cardboard, foil, colored and scotch tape, paint/crayons/markers, scissors, paper and a toilet paper roll.
- Start by cutting out your shield from the cardboard.
- Next cut the white paper so it fits into the middle of the cardboard. This is where your child will draw their coat of arms!
- Time to paint and color your shield. We started with colored pencils
- Then added paint.
- Next we taped them on the cardboard. DON”T Instead cover the whole shield with foil. Tape it on the back.
- Then add your white paper when it’s dry . Tape it on with colored tape ( painters tape works great).
- Cut a toilet paper roll in two and secure it with tape. This picture was taken 4 days after the craft was made . What was it I said about skipping steps while chatting, holding a baby and making crafts?
- Time to play – our boys played for 1.5 hours and amazingly no foil came off, ripped or otherwise needed repair.
Book
Imagine You’re a Knight! (Imagine This!)
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Looking for fast fun Valentine’s Day activities for toddlers and preschoolers? We are doing a bunch today. This weekend was packed with activities for our family so today we are staying home in our Pjs and doing a few of these lovely projects and reading some great books.
I think we will start our day with some gifts . I bought my daughter Where Is Baby’s Valentine?
Then while my daughter naps we’ll play with our Valentine Sensory Tub
While my son watches his favorite show ( Busy Town Mysteries) my daughter and I will paint . Here’s a tip when painting with babies , use painter’s tape to tape the paper down so it’s not thrown , ripped or eaten while painting! 
After lunch we’ll read this and a few other books my son chooses.
Shelia Rae, The Brave by Kevin Henekes In this story Sheila is a brave little mouse, he even taunts her little sister Louise calling her names when she isn’t as brave as her. However soon the tables are turned and when Shelia gets lost it’s her very own scaredy cat sister who shows the bravery. I think a lot of younger siblings can relate to this story, I know I can. Having an older sister who very much like Shelia is the natural leader among the two of us , it’s nice to see the little sister saving the day for once. Edited 02/11 My son is nuts about this book. I read it everyday after lunch, and we talk about how some day his sister might just have to help him and how both girls and boys can be very brave. No matter how many time we read this I enjoy it as much as he does.
Then during quiet time my son will play with this map he loves LeapFrog Tag Maps: World
For dinner we’ll make these heart shaped pizzas 
Before bed we’ll read Snuggle Puppy 
This author is a preschool parents dream, short and easy to read melodic books with illustrations to die for. The story is simply a little love song about all the ways the dog loves the puppy, simple and touching. As an educator something I love is that the dogs don’t have an obvious race , they don’t even have an obvious gender which is perfect. Regardless of who loves who in your family your child can see you in the dog and themselves in the puppy! I think that is the perfect valentine! My son didn’t warm up to this book right away, but now not only does he love it he is very very specific that only I can read it to him . It’s become a big favorite in our house.
Not exactly the red wine and candlelight Valentine’s Day we had before kids but I’d be lying if I said I don’t love being able to have a super day and not even getting out of my PJs.
Happy Valentine’s Day
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I love making handmade Valentines for people and my son and I didn’t see eye to eye about this at first. He wanted to hand out Toy Story Valentines he saw at Target and I wanted him to make them himself for his classmates. Well… this was our compromise which will likely become a tradition. It satisfies his need for characters but still serves the purpose of making custom Valentines for each of his friends. Each was made with the friend in mind which was time consuming but thrilling to see him put that much thought into it. Honestly I don’t know if the stars just aligned , but he loved this craft. We even left the kitchen table as our ” Valentine” factory so we can make more today.
- Gather your materials. You will need some construction paper, some store bought valentines ( whatever your little on begged you for), heart stickers, scissors, paint, glitter ( Come on it’s Valentine’s day let them have glitter !! ), colored pencils and anything else to make them fun and sparkly.
- Start by cutting the construction paper into hearts. Ours are not the most perfect but as you will see they still end up beautiful.
- Time to customize! We started with paint.
- Used colored pencils.
- Glitter
- The works! No two were the same. Yes we made a mess but it was so fun.
- Choose which character valentine each recipient will like the best.
- We originally made them like this with the store bought valentine on the back
but most ended up with it on the front and my son used the whole back to write his name. If you follow me you know how I have been trying to encourage his writing and I didn’t even ask him to do it, he grabbed the pencil and started all on his own. - Oh and for those of you who ask how I manage crafts while my little one is awake …
- This picture isn’t really a “step” in the tutorial but it captures how much fun we had, which is really the whole point of this blog!
Don’t miss this. CBS Los Angeles featured our Heart Shaped Pizza on their site . We are making those again for our Valentine’s Day meal. Do you make something special for your kids’ dinner on Valentine’s Day?
