WIRED - DIY Bead Maze!

Wire is something that is always available in our playroom.  I found this particular floral wire at the Dollar Tree.  Wire is a great medium to explore, create, and manipulate.  Its great for strengthening the muscles in the fingers and hands - improving fine motor skills.  My initial thought was to make a DIY Bead Maze, like one of these:

 

I decided to let the activity remain a little more open ended than that.  But making a bead maze is definitely an option for those of you interested.  You might need a sturdier grade wire, though.

For this activity we used floral wire, styrofoam block (found at Walmart), wire cutters, and pasta wheels (we already had the colored pasta wheels.  You can use anything - beads, pasta, whatever has a hole in it).  My son actually helped me set up the invitation, and the pasta wheels are what he chose.

The Invitation

sticking the wires into the styrofoam

(somewhere along the way, he turned the board over.  I left the wrapping on the contain the potential mess)

 putting on pasta wheels - great for fine motor

 an extra LONG wire...he thought this was fun

 "Its like a roller coaster, Mommy"

- AK (MESE, MECD)

Illuminated Ornaments

Obviously, our children are interested in all things Christmas right now....so we have been doing more "crafts".  While an end product is suggestive, we always allow our children to lead the way and follow the path of play/creativity that they choose.  There is no right or wrong way, and its still all about the process.

We have incorporated fill-able ornaments into our play for a few years now, but one of our readers (Alicia Odom) inspired this activity when she commented on our page saying they had glued gems to their ornaments.  Cool!  Its a lot like our GLASS SCULPTURES post and our GLASS PUMPKIN post, but we had yet to glue anything to the outside of the ornaments.  So............

MATERIALS:

large acrylic fill-able ornaments

gems

hot glue gun

finger lights

The invitation

Gluing on the gems

I had to stop taking pics here because my son said, "Mommy, I'm feeling nervous because last time I used the glue gun I burned my finger and had a blister.  Can you help me, please?"  So he squirt the glue and showed me where to place the gems.

First he wanted to hang the ornament without the light in it.

We added a finger light and he put it on his shelf

Then he decided to hang it from his shelf and that is where is stayed until bed time.  He moved it at bed time because he hates any amount of light in his room while he sleeping.

TIPS:

The ornaments get very heavy once you add the gems.  If you plan to hang it, you will need to hot glue gun the top on.  If you add a finger light, you will need to replace it once it burns out.  We found that it was easy to remove the glued on top, replace the light, and glue the top back on again.  If you plan to place it on a shelf or table, there is no need to glue the top on.

ENJOY


- AK (MESE, MECD)

Pony Bead Ornaments/Suncatchers

We were all set to make some more GLUE CATCHERS the other day when my oldest asked to put beads in hers.  Sure!  This is where it led us.  It's kinda a combination of our glue catchers and WINDOW ART  I was not sure how these were going to dry but they came out great!  DIY fuse beads!  

Materials:

Wax Paper

Pony beads (translucent if you want to use them as a sun catcher)

Glue

Cookie cutter shapes

Place pony beads inside the cookie cutter.  Fill up with glue and let dry!  To prevent the glue from leaking, you can place a heavier object on top of the cutter to hold it down in place.  We filled ours up just enough to cover the beads.  These took a little while longer to dry... I think 3 days??  After they were dry we flipped them over.  Before popping them out of the cookie cutter, we gave them a coat of modge podge just to make sure they would stick.  I'm not sure if we needed this or not but my daughter was so excited about these I really wanted them to work!  

My 21M old filling hers up with glue.  She could care less about the beads.  She just wanted to squeeze!  

My oldest filling hers up with beads

Pouring glue over top

Finished...  Still need to dry them.

Dried and up in the window!  It was not sunny today but you get the idea.  :-)  To hang them we just cleared out a hole in one of the glued pony beads.  I used floral wire to hang them because we will eventually transfer these to the tree when it's up!  

Close up

RL 

A Photographic Twist On Window Art

For our original post on Window Art click HERE

My oldest loves her window art projects and we do them often. I love love love taking pictures and doing photo projects.  My girls also love all the photo projects we do together.   I thought it would be a neat idea to add a picture to our window art.  I had no clue if this could be done so I did an internet search.  I love how you can find anything on the internet these days!  I came across this site.   

http://inspiredideasmag.blogspot.com/2008/05/making-memory-candles-project-from.html

I was super excited because one... you can actually transfer pictures to glass, and two... I had all the materials I needed! 

Please see the link above for directions on how to transfer a picture to glass.  They used a candle... another cute idea.  However, I like how great ours came out.  I may be bias though.  :-)  

My oldest enjoyed using the extra strips of contact paper to make a cast on her arm.  

She thought this was the funniest thing in the world.  

The picture we used.  

I can't take credit for this picture.  It was taken by Maureen Norcross of In Focus Photography.  Fantastic photographer for those of you in the surrounding area of Raleigh, NC  

http://www.infocusphoto07.com/

Again, with the casting of her leg.  LOL  

Painting the frame.

Adding gems

Proud little girl!  

These weren't dry yet.  This is what it looked like on top of the light panel.  

This is with my flash on.  

They are still drying.  Can't wait to see what they look like up in the window!  

RL  

Glue Catchers

Materials:

Cookie Cutters (We purchased a pack of 6 at Walmart for 88 cents)

Glue (We used white Elmers glue)

Food coloring 

Squirt bottle (We used condiment bottles from Walmart.. 99 cents)

Wax Paper

Glitter (Optional) 

Mix glue and food coloring in squirt bottles.  Place your cookie cutters on a piece of wax paper and squeeze away!  

My 22 Month old is not one for arts and crafts and she loved this one.  Squeezing glue into cutters.

Shaking on some glitter

More glue.

She had a better angle from on top of the table.  :-)  As you can see here... my oldest was not yet ready to join this invitation.  

More glitter sprinkling.  

My oldest decided to join in.  Some intense glitter shaking!  

Finished.  

These were maybe 1/8th of an inch thick??  They took a day and a half to dry completely.  I just cut a small slit in them with a knife and hung them with fishing wire and sticky putty.  

After some people having problems with leaks I decided to try a different way to give you another option.... 

Place your design underneath the wax paper.

Take a hot glue gun, outline the design, and fill up with your white glue!  I used two layers of hot glue for the border.  You could probably put some hot glue around your cookie cutter to keep the glue from leaking as well.  We will have to try that one next time.  

Finished.

2013

Invitation to make Easter Egg Glue Catchers

We've learned a lot since first starting with these.  2 layers of hot glue works perfectly.  Also, instead of wax paper, use a piece of glass or pelxi glass.  This way it peels off smoothly and you can pick it up and move it where ever you like while they are drying.  

Filled eggs.  

Up in the window.

RL  

Candy Canes and Snowflakes

My students loved these when I taught pre-k.  Its a little more "guided" than some of our other activities...but there can be guidance without a right or wrong way, which is important to remember.  I presented the invitation, explained what it was, and then let my son take the lead.  This activity is a true test of fine motor skills for a toddler.....and patience, and persistence, and emotional regulation, etc etc etc.  Ha ha ha ha!

Things you need:

• beads
• wire OR pipe cleaners

CANDY CANES

 

Our BEADS

wire, pipe cleaners, beads

 My son ASKED me to help him with this one....just with the color part.  I asked him what colors he would like to use and he said red and white (which became clear because we didn't have white).  We had a lot of dialogue back and forth during this process.  A lot of "What color is next, Mommy?" and "Hmmm, let's see.  Can you tell me what colors you have already and maybe we can figure it out together".  GREAT for patterning!!

 stringing the beads - fine motor skills in action

 candy canes....all done and ready to hang on the tree

Another option is to super glue a pin like this on the back of the candy cane and give as a gift.  This is what most of my students would choose to do when I was teaching.

SNOWFLAKES

For the snowflakes my son cut a pipe cleaner into four pieces and then used 3 of those pieces to make the skeleton of the snowflake (sorry for the lack of pics).  I made the skeleton for him.

stringing beads onto snowflake....he chose whatever colors he wanted and didn't ask me for any help

 I used fishing line to hang, and wire cutters to turn in the tips of each arm of the snowflake

Finished product

[Another ornament or pin you can make with these materials - Christmas wreaths]

- AK (MESE, MECD)