We’ve painted on wood, and made wood constructions with hot glue, but we still have loads of wood scraps hanging around, thanks to our never ending renovations.

One thing we’ve not done much of is traditional hammer and nails wood work, but when The Father Figure discovered a couple of old, small, hammers and put new handles on them… well we had to try them out!

Starting a nail isn’t easy, even for bigger hands, and there were one or two banged fingers and a bit of frustration but no major injuries. With a bit of practice and some instruction on where to put your hands so you don’t hammer your fingers they soon got better at it.

After they found some ear muffs, because it was kinda of loud with all that banging, then they really got into it. Adding some plastic bottle caps to their creations.

And to finish it off I broke out a new packet of markers…. my kids love new markers almost as much as I do!

Have you ever done wood work with your kids?
Got any good tips for us?

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Working With Wood. is a post from: picklebums.com

A recent delivery came in a big box! The was much excitement as the big kids and I surveyed the long, but shallow box and pondered what we could do with it. It wasn’t big enough for a cubby, and it was too big to make into a car. Then I had an idea…

I got out the markers and drew some roads on the bottom of the box, then left the kids to decide what to do next.

A little while later there were many more roads, a beach, some paddocks for the horses, Hargid’s house, a droid workshop and somewhere for the Ewoks to sleep.

The big box had become a whole town. More drawings have been added since then and the legos have been built and rebuilt, arranged and rearranged…

Not only has it keep the kids engaged for hours and hours, it’s also contained all those tiny bits of lego. No more standing on a droid head and trying not to swear!

Stay tuned for more things we’ve been doing with the big box!

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What To Do With a Big Box? – Make a Town is a post from: picklebums.com

Painting a mural together means you not only spend time painting, you also spend time negotiating, being patient and communicating.

Not to mention sharing, encouraging, working together, planning, and helping each other.

Sometimes, there’s more to painting than it seems…

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Easy Art For Kids – Painting Together. is a post from: picklebums.com

A little forward thinking and some treasures frozen into blocks of ice makes a run of super hot days a LOT more bearable.

What do you do to beat the heat?

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Sensory Play – Icy Fun! is a post from: picklebums.com

I remember the day we visited the girls’ kinder for the first time, just to see what it was like. They had a shop set up in the home corner area and immediately my just turned four year old girls made a beeline for it and stayed playing shop for the whole time we were there.

Now, four years later, nothing has changed. When someone says the magical words ‘let’s play shop’ eyes still light up and little faces still beam… there is just more of them now! And these days ‘playing shop’ is more involved then a just a basket and a few empty boxes!

These days we need to make our own money, and share it out equally between all the shoppers.

We need to make a sign, and don’t forget to add the shop’s web address too.

Then you have to arrange all the goods, find some bags, baskets and trolleys and distract your baby brother somehow… then… then you are ready to play shop!

Do you kids like to play shop?
What other dramatic play themes do they enjoy?

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Playing Shop. is a post from: picklebums.com

There is nothing better than a bit of water play on a hot day, or even on a cold one.

Water play is one of those activities that offers opportunity for learning in all developmental areas. It’s soothing, engaging and just plain fun, yet sometimes it seems like too much work and too much mess, but it doesn’t have to be. Keeping it simple can make water play much more manageable.

At the end of last week it was hot and sunny. My smallest was also hot, and miserable with a bit of a temperature. It had been a long and cranky day and it was only half over. I needed something to both engage him and cool him down a little…. water!

Instead of setting up a tub which he (being only 18 months old) would immediately dump out all over the floor and himself (and enjoy every minute of it), I decided to keep it really simple….

Spreading out a towel on the floor I sat him in the middle and gave him a couple of cups, a small bowl and some spoons. Into each bowl and cup I put an ice block. That’s it.

He sat and tipped the ice blocks out, put them in the bowl, tipped them out again, tasted them, squeezed them, put them in the cup and stirred them around with the spoon…

When they had melted I gave him a few more.

When he was done there was a few small wet patches on the floor where he’d strayed off the towel, and the towel was damp in spots, so I used it to wipe up the floor and clean up was done. He was wet down his front as I’d left his top on, but if he’d have been only in a nappy I could have towelled him off also!

Not only did it cool him down a little, he had lots of fun and learnt lots as well, and my sanity wasn’t stretched even further by this KISS water play idea.

Do you play with water at your house?

Joining in with It’s Play Time at Let The Children Play, and The Play Academy at Nurture Store.

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Sensory Play – Keep it Simple with Ice Blocks is a post from: picklebums.com

“I want to sick something! Mum can I glue something? You know, stick stuff? You know, like with glue?”

It makes me smile the way he talks. From a 2 year old who didn’t even say ‘Mama’ to a four year old who who talks like a geeky teenager.

How can I say no to a request like that?

So I dig out the pot of home-made paste and find some cardboard (we save cereal boxes to cut up and paste on) and then search the recesses of my frazzled brain for things he could paste with. I really need to write a list of good collage materials I tell myself as I cut up some origami paper (it’s all I could find) and start making a collection.

So here it is… a list of things to stick…. you know… like with glue.

Easy to find, Easy to Glue, Collage Materials.

Recycled Wrapping Paper
Recycled Christmas/Birthday Cards
Paper Streamers
Junk Mail
Recycled printed papers
Old Magazines
Feathers
Cotton Balls
Patty Pans (cup cake wrappers)
Flowers
Leaves
Grass
Sticks
Cellophane
Tissue Paper
Confetti
Fabric Scraps
Wool/String
Ribbons
Foil
Sequins
Packing Peanuts
Bubble Wrap
Match sticks/Tooth Picks
Icy Pole Sticks
Paper Doilies

I am sure there are lots more things to add to this list. What have I forgotten? What’s your favourite collage material?

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Easy Art for Kids – Easy to find, Easy to Glue, Collage Materials is a post from: picklebums.com

My four year old has discovered a new found love of all things letters and writing.

He is at the stage of wanting to write way beyond his abilities. He is still learning to form most of the letters and to manipulate his pencil well enough to write them. He wants to know how to write everything and constantly throws random combinations of letters at me and asks what it spells.

I needed a break from figuring out how to pronounce the word ‘dmjko’ so I devised a cunning plan that encouraged his new found love of letters, spelling and writing, but needed less input from me.

I printed out some pages of upper and lower case letters and threw in some numbers for good measure. Printing a few pages, each in a different font I cut them up into individual letters and got out some paper and our handy dandy home-made paste.

“oooh lots of letters” He said when he discovered what I was doing.
“Yep… lots of letters, now you can make lots of words…. any words you like!” I told him and left him to it.

After a few minutes he called me back to read what he had written…

“It’s all the important words Mum” he told me…. and it was, all the very important words.

Do your kids enjoy cutting and pasting?

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Easy Art For Kids – Letter Collage. is a post from: picklebums.com

My girls don’t like Santa. They never have, and I’m beginning to think they never will.

These days, at a very grown up eight years of age, they can keep themselves together when they walk past a giant blow up Santa in a shop, but no amount of lollies can bribe them to get any where near a real live Santa. Not even some very rude and mean spirited people telling them that if they don’t like Santa they won’t get any presents has made them change their mind. They just don’t like the jolly old over dressed man, not one bit.

To get around the whole lack of presents idea the two of them decided that they were ok with Santa landing his sleigh in the paddock. He can touch down far, far, from our house, over near the windmill, and then send his Angels into the house to deliver the loot. Yep… bet you didn’t know that as well as all those reindeer, Santa also travels with two Christmas angels.

So it is the Christmas Angels that deliver gifts to our house, and it is The Angels who receive copious amounts of mail at around this time of the year.

Santa does get a little letter love…

Morgan decided he LOVED Santa as a two year old and proclaimed it loudly, much to his sisters’ disgust, but when it came time to actually say hello to him and get the expected lolly, the love wasn’t so forth-coming. But Morgan happily sat down to write a letter to Santa last night, even making a really good attempt at writing ‘Santa’ too.

If you’d like to write some Christmas letters, to Santa, the Angels or maybe just to friends and family, I have made a Christmas version of my kids letter writing set (You can find writing set 1 here and writing set 2 here.).

This set comes with three different writing papers. Each writing paper design comes in a lined and un-lined version, for those who’d are not quite ready to write yet (as requested by a reader) and each has a matching evelope template, just cut, fold and stick.

You can download the Christmas Letter Writing set in a zipped folder here, via 4shared (no password problems this time… I hope!)

There will be a new Christmas themed printable each Monday until Christmas, and a few random extras thrown in too! Follow me via facebook, or subscribe via rss to make sure you don’t miss out and be sure to check out last week’s Christmas Printable – Christmas Postcard Template – just add your own photos and you are ready to print!

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2011 Christmas Printable Series – Christmas Letter Writing Set. is a post from: picklebums.com

Have you ever tried crafting with fusible beads?

I’d seen packets of Hama beads in our local toy shop, but I never really knew what they were until Hardie Grant sent my kids and I copies of the two new Kid’s Crafternoon Books. The Beading book features little birdy earrings made from fusible beads on the front cover and that inspired us to pick up some beads and bead boards and have a play.

The fusible beads are really tiny, and quite tricky to keep under control, so we started out just playing with patterns and colours to make basic shapes while we got the hang on them.

Once you’ve arranged your beads in the pattern you want on the board, you place baking paper over them and ‘fuse’ them with a hot iron for a few seconds. It took me a while to figure out the optimum amount of iron time and how much melt you needed to get the items to really stay stuck together, but even the ones I over melted still looked pretty cool

We had a go at one of the birds in the Beading book. The girls followed the pattern easily and were thrilled with the results. The bird inspired them to come up with their own more complex patterns and we ended up making the first letter in each of their names, a beaver (?!) and lots of other letters, shapes and patterns.

The girls LOVED this activity. It’s spot on for a 7-8 year old who like to sit and create, playing with patterns and colours. They sat and created for nearly two hours!

Morgan found it just a little tricky to get the beads to go where he wanted them, and getting them stay there (so did I!). He gave up after a while, preferring to offer colour selection advice to the rest of us.

I really enjoyed this activity too and my mind is whirring with cool things you could do with these beads! The Kids’ Crafternoon Beading book offers inspiration for using the fusible beads to make earrings, magnets and even bunting! I think they’d make cool bracelets if you made small circles and strung them together and we are thinking of turning our letters in to broaches. You can also string these as regular beads, so they are quite versatile, and lots of fun.

I blogged about the first two Kids’ Crafternoon books, Papercraft and Sewing, back in July. Now there are two new books to add to the series – Kids’ Crafternoon Beading and Kids’ Crafternoon Felting. Edited by Kathreen from Whipup, the two new books are just as lovely as the first two. Full of interesting projects from a variety of contributors, and perfect for kids aged 6 and up, and adults too of course!

All four books are available from Booktopia.

Win one of two Kids’ Crafternoon Books!

This competition is now closed, winners have been notified

If you’d like to win a copy of either the beading or felting book all you need to do is leave a comment on this post and tell me what you’d make from fusible beads. Please be sure to also let me know which book you would like to win. The most creative, funny, and interesting answers will win.

Terms & Conditions
You must be an Australian resident to enter and provide a valid email address.
Entries are limited to one per household.
Entries close Thursday December 1st 2011
One winner for each book with be notified via email and announced on this post by December 2nd 2011
Winners must contact me within 7 days or the prize will be re-drawn.
Winners postal address will be passed on to Hardie Grant Books and the prizes will be sent directly from them.

Follow along with the virtual book tour and find out what these other super talented crafty bloggers have to say about these lovely books –

• Lisa Tilse from The Red Thread – 14-Nov
• Suzie Fry – 15-Nov
• Larissa Holland from mmmCrafts – 16-Nov
• Pascale Mestdagh from Between the Lines – 17-Nov
• Christine Chitnis – 18-Nov
• Holly Keller from Chez Beeper Bebe – 19-Nov
• Monica Solorio-Snow from The Happy Zombie – 20-Nov
• Cate Holst from Go Make Me – 21-Nov
• Shannon Cook from Luvinthemommyhood – 22-Nov
• Jennifer Casa from JCHandmade – 23-Nov
• Steph Morgan from Modern Parents Messy Kids – 25-Nov
• Kara Fleck from Simple Kids – 26-Nov
• Li’l Magoolie – 27-Nov
• Jackie Boucher from Oh Dee Doh – 28-Nov
• Bianca from Sadie and Lance – 29-Nov
• Tricia Hogbin from Little Eco Footprints – 30-Nov
• Lisa Siebert guest posting at Poppytalk – 1-Dec

{ Disclosure: I was given a copy of each book to review. I was not compensated in any other way for this post. The opinions in this post are purely my own. }

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Fusible Beads and a Kids’ Crafternoon Give Away. is a post from: picklebums.com