Balloon Powered Boat

I have so many posts to catch up on in here, I'll do my best to get through them over the weekend! We've had two sick little girls with the flu bug so not as much craft action as usual, but these balloon powered boats were a big hit today while we (finally :-D) enjoyed some nice warm weather.

WE USED:

* rectangular plastic container
(we used a cornstarch food container, but an empty margarine/ice cream container would work well too)
* sharp knife/craft knife
* drinking straw
* balloon
* sticky tape
* small elastic band
* scissors
* blu tack/sticky tack

First use your knife to make a small hole in one end of your container just big enough for your straw to fit through.

Cut your straw in half and attach the balloon to one end using sticky tape and the elastic band. It should be secure enough that you can use the straw to blow up the balloon without it leaking around the sides.

Thread your straw through the hole in your 'boat' making sure the balloon end is on the inside.

Use your blu tack to secure the straw on each side so it is watertight. You could also use Plasticine for this.

One balloon powered boat ready for the water!

Using the straw blow up the balloon and then kink or put your finger over the end so the air doesn't escape.

Place your boat in the water, let go of the straw and off it goes :-)

The girls enjoyed racing their boats around the paddling pool.

Animals With Spots And Stripes

We have half a container of cotton buds to use in our craft projects after Squeak decorated the bathroom floor with them recently, so today we used some for painting with. We have used them for unstructured painting before but this time we did something a little more structured and talked about animals with stripes and spots.

WE USED:

* paper
* lead pencil
* black marker/texta
* paint
(we used orange, yellow, brown and black)
* cotton buds

To make the animal pictures minus their stripes and spots I found images on the net and then traced them straight off the screen onto my paper using a lead pencil (be careful not to press too hard against the screen). It was easy to trace what I needed onto my page and omit what I didn't need, then later I went over the pictures with black marker.

We used yellow, brown, orange and black paint to suit the animals we were using.

Some animals Bubble knew the colours and patterns of, but others like the Dalmatian dog weren't familiar to her so we looked them up on the Internet and chatted about what markings they had.

Glass Stone Stacking & Patterning

We use our glass stones for all sorts of things; in our imaginary play scenes, counting games and as 'money' when playing shops, laid side by side to make roads and write letters.
Yesterday we used them for a fine motor stacking activity and also patterning games so that Bubble could practice sequencing and Squeak her colours.

WE USED:

* glass stones
(you can find bags of these at most dollar or home decor shops)

Bubble found stacking the stones challenging, it gave her fine motor control a good workout!

Both girls enjoyed the patterning activity; we made sequences of varying lengths, making them longer as we went.

A two colour sequence.

Three colour sequence.

Paper Plate Stencils

Sorry for the long delays between posting, we are doing a lot of work on Bubble's ABA program which is taking up most (all really!) of our spare time. Both Bubble and Squeak are showing benefits from it though, so we're very excited about that :-)
This activity is one we have done a few times before using both ice cream container lids and paper plates. We find the paper plate versions last for quite a few uses and the the lids last indefinitely.

WE USED:

* paper plates
* scissors
* pen/texta
* paint
* paper
* paint brush

Draw your stencil designs directly onto the base of your plates (or lids).

Cut out carefully using scissors or a craft knife.

ANZAC Day

Here in Australia (and in NZ) we celebrate ANZAC Day today, a national day of remembrance of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps who fought in Gallipoli during WW1. It is also an opportunity to honour all servicemen, past and present, and their families for the sacrifices they have made (and still make).
The red poppy is often worn in honour of our ANZAC'S, so last night I made some wearable poppies for my girls to use today. They were very simple to make and a very cute way for them to show support, even if they don't fully understand the magnitude of what today means. Our girls are too little to learn about history in any great detail yet (particularly conflict and war) but they are not too young to be grateful for the wonderful country we live in.
On our daily walk today we were lucky enough to come across quite a few ex servicemen in their uniforms and medals, going to or returning from services and functions. Some shook our girls hands, some patted their heads and all of them smiled at Bubble's sincere "thank you for my happy Ansac (ANZAC) Day".

WE USED:

* red and green felt
* embroidery thread and needle
* black metal snap fasteners (or black buttons)
* superglue
* scissors
* metal hair clips or slides

First cut petal shapes from your red felt. I cut five for each poppy clip.

Arrange them into your flower shape making sure they all overlap at least a little and meet in the centre.

Sew the petals together in the middle using embroidery thread. There's no need to be very neat or make too many stitches (as you can see, I'm a very novice sewer!).

I used black metal press studs for the next step but you could just as easily use a black button, large beads or black felt.

Push through the top press stud making sure all the petals are included in the centre before attaching the bottom plate underneath (I just use pliers to push the two sides together).

On green felt trace around the end of your hair clip/slide (x 2, one piece for each side) leaving some space around the edge to sew the two halves together.
On one half attach the other side of your press stud before gluing and stitching the two sides onto your clip (if you used a button or bead for the centre of your poppy then sew the flower directly onto the green felt instead).

In this picture you can see the two sides of the clips, with the press stud on the top. I glued the felt before sewing it securely, just make sure you don't cover too much of the clip so it still opens and closes.

Attach your poppy using the press studs.

Ode of Remembrance
(taken from Laurence Binyon's poem "For the Fallen")

They went with songs to the battle, they were young.

Straight of limb, true of eyes, steady and aglow.

They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted,

They fell with their faces to the foe.

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:

Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.

At the going down of the sun and in the morning,

We will remember them.

Happy Earth

For Earth Day yesterday we did a simple sorting activity similar to our "How Do I Feel" game. Since Bubble is so young I kept the concepts simple, such as; 'recycle and reuse', 'walking instead of driving our car' and 'planting trees' for some of our happy earth statements and 'wasting water', 'throwing our rubbish on the ground' and 'not taking care animals and wildlife' as some of our unhappy earth statements. For older children you could use more complex ideas or even focus on one topic such as pollution or looking after the ocean.
I wasn't sure if Bubble would be very into this activity but we've played it five times over since yesterday afternoon, so I think it was a success!

WE USED:

to make our earth faces:

* paper plates
* blue food colouring
* paint brush
* green paint
* permanent marker

For the game:

* paper plate earth faces
* blutack (or sticky tack)
* statement cards
(made by cutting up speech cards and writing statements that have a positive and negative impact on the Earth. We made seven for each but you could do as many as you like!

Our Earth faces were made by painting paper plates with blue food colouring to get a watery effect, then adding green paint after it was dry.

We then drew on our faces with permanent marker
and stuck them to the wardrobe door with blutack for our sorting activity, but this could easily be done on a table top or the floor too.

I read out our statements one by one and we talked about what each one meant and which side it should go on.
Some Bubble found easy, such as 'looking after animals and wildlife' and 'wasting our food'. Others were harder such as 'using lots of chemicals in our home' and 'conserving our water'. This game was such a great way to introduce lots of topics to Bubble that we had never discussed before without the whole thing being overwhelming or too confusing. She could identify with the Earth feeling 'happy' or 'sad'.