DIY Soft Light Sabers

For my son's Star Wars-themed birthday, we set up several different types of games, all with Star Wars flavour!  One of the games was a light saber duel, and we needed something that could be used without harming any of the kids.  We also still needed some kind of party favour.  Enter the soft light saber, a toy that is still getting lots of use in our house a year and half later!

Supplies:

foam pool noodle

electrical tape in 1-2 colours

duct tape in black

magic marker

Directions:

1. Cut the pool noodle in half.

2. Wrap one end of the pool noodle with three strips of duct tape, creating the light saber handle.  Wrap each end of the duct tape in coloured electrical tape.

3. Use the magic marker (we used fat Sharpies) to darken the cut end.

4. Have fun!

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Michael's Knock Off Chenille Chain Garland

Welcome to Day 6 of Creating Christmas!

 

I was at Michael's the other day checking out all the Christmas fabulousness, and saw these:

Chenille Chain Garlands!  These are made exactly like the paper chains you made probably every single year when you were little.  Except these were basically made with pipe cleaners!

All you need is a pair of scissors and your pipe cleaners, and you are good to go!

Cut into desired length.  I cut mine in thirds.

Make a loop and twist the ends around each other.  

Thread a new piece of pipe cleaner through your loop, and loop again.  Repeat.

So cute for a kid's tree!  I think it would be awesome in metallic colours like copper and gold!

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Homespun Style Ornaments

Welcome to Day 4 of Creating Christmas!  

At our home, the main tree is finally almost done!  Yay!  And it smells so good!  I love the Christmas tree smell; it just makes me want to curl up in a big chair with a hot tea and a good book with only the tree lights on.  

We can't finish our tree for another day or two...  Is it just me, or do the ornament hooks disappear every. single. year.?  I even had the bag out to do two trees, then we were doing one additional tree, and off they went.  (I had two brand new boxes of hooks in addition to all the other hooks in the bag.)  Hubby had to go out to Walmart to get more, but they were sold out.  So he went out again the next day to a different store and got me two boxes.  They're all used up and I have another 30 ornaments or so left to hang...  Gotta find those missing hooks!  Ahhh!

Each one of our trees has a different theme and colour scheme.  My daughter has her pink glam tree, my son has a vintage toy inspired tree, the upstairs tree is gold and natural elements, and the main {real} tree is almost always red with metallics.  I thought I would focus my new-found ornament skills on my son's tree.  It has all the wooden ornaments from my childhood tree on it like rocking horses, nutcrackers, and angels, as well as some miscellaneous things like s'mores ornaments, Starbucks mittens (from gift cards) and hot rod car ornaments.  It's really cute, but I wanted something else to add to it.  So here is what I did...

SUPPLIES

yarn

buttons (if desired)

hot glue gun

styrofoam ball

DIRECTIONS

Begin by gluing a tiny length of yarn onto the styrofoam ball.  Begin to make a tight circle of yarn, gluing as you go.  

Keep wrapping and gluing, wrapping and gluing.  When you are almost done, cut a separate length of yarn about 8 inches long and glue both ends together to the ball.  This will become the hook for the ornament. (Alternately, once finished, just loop a length and glue it down.  Trim the end off.)

Finish wrapping and gluing.  

Glue buttons on the yarn if you would like.  My buttons are actually vintage buttons from my grandmother's button box. 

You can also wrap the yarn in different patterns, just be aware that the time will increase depending on the complexity of your pattern.  I made one with different sizes of circles and it took me about 3 times as long to cover the whole ball.

I also made one that resembles a ball of yarn.  I just wrapped the yarn in various directions all over the styrofoam ball, making sure that no white spots were showing.  Then I tied several loose pieces around the outside in order to have little yarn ends poking out here and there.

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Christmas Tree Crayons

I wanted to make new crayons from the huge amount of broken ones we have!  I have seen so many crayon-makeover tutorials around the blogosphere, but this one is different because (1) they are Christmas trees, (2) I used glitter!, and (3) they are gradient-friendly!  Ha ha!

Supplies:

crayons

silicone ice cube tray

glitter

lots of little people to peel the crayon papers off!

 

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 225 F.  Peel the paper wrappers off the crayons and chop into small pieces.

Assemble similar shades of colours together; pack tightly into a silicone ice cube tray. Add a pinch or two of a similar shade glitter.

Place in the oven for 5 minutes.  Check to see if the crayons are thoroughly melted.   If so, remove carefully and place on counter to cool completely.  If not, leave tray in the oven and check every minute or two until fully melted.  Once cooled, pop out of the tray and enjoy!

I think they are so festive!!  I am going to do a couple trays of these for Christmas gifts and stocking stuffers!

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DIY Twine Balls

Super easy and possibly messy!  These twine balls are awesome hanging, as part of a visual collection, or piled into a decorative bowl.

Get a friend to help and, if you are making the giant ones, get more friends!  I did some with those giant balloons (3 feet in diameter), and I had one person feeding the twine to the glue person.  The glue person then fed the goopy twine to me and I needed two people to help hold the balloon.  So we needed five people to do the biggies.

Supplies:

balloons

vaseline

string/twine/jute/yarn

toothpicks

glue

water

plastic plate

plastic tablecloths

Directions:

1. Blow up your balloons, making sure they stay as round as possible.  Some balloons can get really egg-shaped quickly, so use them for the tinier balls.  Once inflated, rub a small amount of vaseline onto the surface, coating thoroughly.

2. In the plastic plate, mix up your glue by blending 3 parts glue to 1 part water.  Saturate the twine by running it through the glue, wiping off excess with your fingers.

3. Wrap the twine randomly around the balloon.  Tuck your end under the twine to hold it in place.

Thanks to K & A for being my photo models!

4. Hang the balloons to dry.  We tied them onto a large dowel (a hockey stick or unused broom stick would work too) and let them dry for 24 hours.  Make sure you put a plastic tarp or tablecloth underneath to catch all the paint drips! (Note: you don't need to use a fan or hairdryer on these.  We were only trying to accelerate the dry time.)

5. Poke the balloon gently with a toothpick to pop it.  Pull the deflated balloon carefully out through the open spaces of the twine.  Use the toothpick to remove any bits of dried glue from between the twine, and you're all done!

6. To hang, using fishing line to attach to the twine balls and a tack to attach to the ceiling.

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M&M Costume Faces

I made up some cute iron-ons for an M&M candy costume!  Just select 'reverse image' in your printer properties, print, cut out, and iron on to your fabric!  

Alternately, just print out onto regular paper, cut out, and glue to bristol board.

BOY

GIRL

M

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Autumn Napkin Wrap

Easy autumn napkin wrap with supplies you probably already have on hand!  I already had everything, so this was a free craft for me!

SUPPLIES

napkins

hot glue

craft paper

raffia

feathers

Step 1: Fold napkin into desired size.  I used a regular sized linen napkin and folded in half, half again, and half again.

Step 2: Cut brown craft paper into a rectangle.  Turn napkin over so edges are on the top. 

Step 3: Hot glue the craft paper together to make a wrap.

Step 4: Turn over again so seam from paper is underneath.  Glue raffia onto paper.

Step 5: Glue a sweet lil feather onto the middle of the raffia.  These were pheasant feathers, I believe.

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Pan Flute Craft

My son made this cute craft at school.  You will need 8 drinking straws and tape for this craft.  

Simply cut straws into four lengths (two straws per length) and tape together!

Blow gently through the straws to play your pan flute!  Try blowing directly on the straws and then without touching your lips to the straws and see what sounds you can make.

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Noah's Ark Craft

This is such an easy and cute craft for toddlers and younger children.

Print off a picture of an ark.  I made this one when 90 seconds of looking online didn't come up with one I liked.  (Does someone need to sing the Patience Song?  Ha ha!!)  Colour and then cut out.  Parents can help cut if the kids aren't quite at the scissors stage.

Glue onto a dark or stormy colour background.  I had a wonderful blue-grey that was perfect!

Rip tissue paper into long, jagged strips for the waves.  Crunch slightly in your hands and then gently smooth out again for some extra texture.  Using different colours really helps to show depth, so I grabbed bright blue, grey, and black.  Glue starting with the top layer and overlapping as you go.

Place glue dots (use white school glue or hot glue gun, not a gluestick!) in the sky area and attach sequins for the raindrops.  Chalk dots would also look great!

Viola!  Noah's ark in the stormy waves! :)

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Paper Easter Eggs Craft

Here is a free and fun Easter craft that you can make with things you probably already have in your house!  It's easy enough for toddlers to do, although they will need assistance with cutting and gluing.

Supplies:

Paper

Pen

Bowl (or something similar for tracing)

Crayons

Extras:

Glitter

Glue

Directions:

1. Trace your bowl with a pen to make your outline.  I used the plastic Ikea kids' bowls because they are oval shaped.

 

2. Colour.

 

 

3. Cut shapes out and add glue/glitter if using.  Let dry.

 

4. Hang them up!  I used stick tack to hang them on a mirror, but you could use tape or hang from string or ribbons.  Voila!  Handmade Easter eggs!