I am delighted to be sharing with you an introduction to Nurturestore’s new book Super Sensory Invitations to Play. I have known Cathy pretty much since I started blogging and she is a fabulous educator, creative mama and also a real inspiration. We are sharing with you today just one of the 52 activities in the book – DIY Puffy Paint
Both my boys are maths geeks. They have loved numbers and maths since they were small and are great with mental maths. They have also always loved art and crafts, but the older they get (they are nine and ten) they do less art and I want to encourage them. This is where maths and art collide – parabolics.
Some days it is either too hot for outdoor activities or just plain raining and you just don’t fancy playing out in the rain. So here are some fab, fun and screen free indoor activities to keep the kids occupied.
I adore colouring in. Finally, someone has acknowledged that colouring in is great for adults as well as children and I no longer have to use the kids colouring books. We love family colouring and have had some great evenings colouring in on a super piece of fabric I got from Ikea with fabric pens and now we can all do colouring-in as a fab relaxing screen-free activity. So I have free adult coloring pages to share with you that I love.
My kids love recycled art projects, they are a great way of using up our household recycling and repurposing it into something amazing and it seems like we are not the only ones. At last weeks Fabulously Frugal Linky we had some amazing recycled art projects and activities linked up. Recycled Art Projects
We love making pieces of art that we can display seasonally in The Mad House. Last year we made a family fingerprint heart canvas and I have been thinking about making a family fingerprint relief heart art canvas since then. We finally got round to making it and it was so much fun to make and perfect for displaying in our home. How to make a family fingerprint relief heart art canvas
Here’s an easy poppy craft, which is a great Remembrance Day activity for children. We have made a display of poppies and a paper plate poppy wreath, but you can use the same technique to make a poppy brooch by added a pin on the rear or a display of poppies for your home, church or school. The mini mad’s will be taking the poppies to my mum’s grave in remembrance of her. These poppies were inspired by the fab wax paper flowers at Homegrown Friends. How to make melted wax poppies with KidsMaterials:
We love loo roll and cardboard tube crafts so after our Salt Art Firework we decided to try some cardboard tube firework art. Materials:
Now I know that now everyone is as relaxed as I am when it comes to kids painting and the mess it can create. But the summer is a great time to try and lower your worry factor and get painting outdoors. The key to being more relaxed is preparation, so get a big bowl of soapy water and a towel ready for cleanups. I have even been known to take the hosepipe to the boys to clean them up or bath them in the paddling pool. We are big fans of the large rolls of paper that you can get from Ikea.
Sometimes it is really easy for us to fix a finished idea in our head when crafting and creating with our kids, especially in this Pinterest age. I can be be guilty of this too and it was one of the reasons that I stopped doing tutorials when the boys were younger as their idea of the finished product was often not the same as mine.
I am a huge fan of art, craft and drawing (as you possibly know if you read my blog regularly) and when John Lewis Insurance asked me to share my favourite drawing of what matters most to my children it was a hard, hard job as I love pretty much everything they produce for different reasons. I love the act of making art and nurturing children’s drawings and one of the wisest things that I was told is to never ask what a drawing is, but to ask “Tell me more about your drawing” So I took this opportunity to go through my boys artwork and let me tell you there more »
Stones and sticks, there us something about my boys and these materials. We seem to collect these “treasures” wherever we go and I have to make sure I empty trouser pockets before washing them or I would be busy washing stones too!
This week has been filled with a nasty vomiting bug, which has really taken us back to basics in The Mad House. We have done a lot of reading, watching movies and simple art and drawing. So I decided to concentrate on that for this week’s something for the weekend. We received an amazing gift pack from Australian company Smiggle, who have just opened up a store at Westfield and it included a fantastic scratch book, which is what inspired this weeks activity, make your own scratch paper.
The boys really enjoyed being allowed to stick the post-it notes to the wall and I felt safe in the knowledge knowing that they would not mark the paintwork or stick permanently.
We used Super Sticky fully adhesive Post-it notes which are in fab vibrant colours. 3M have just launched Post-It Notes Colour Cubes which have many more bright and lovely colours. Why not check out Post-It UK Facebook Page for more information on the new range of Post-It Notes and see other peoples pictures too.
Materials:
Plain bags (Mine we 99p from Hobbycraft)
Fabric paints (mine were from a set from Yellow Moon, which I have had for seven years)
Paper plates
paint brush
Apple
Fabric pain pens (again from Yellow Moon)
A3 paper or card
My boys are like chalk and cheese, as I have said before. Maxi was writing by age three, whereas, Mini really doesn’t enjoy mark making or writing. He is a perfectionist and gets upset that it doesn’t look like he thinks it is supposed to, this isn’t helping in mu opinion with the school teaching cursive handwriting from Reception. Up to now this hasn’t been an issue for him, but it is really starting to get him down and also to hold him back. Why you ask? Well he knows all his letters and sounds and is a great phonic reader, but he is so reticent about writing that the school more »
