Shark Valentine Card Box

Sometimes I wish I could be a kid again just to experience the magic of different holidays.  Do you ever feel that way?  As a child New Years seemed cooler, Christmas seemed more magical, and Valentine's Day was way more romantic.  Now that Chuck's getting older, I see him getting excited about holidays too.... and I LOVE it.

Here's a fun Valentine Card Box that I recently designed with Chuck in mind.  (He loooooves sharks.) Isn't it hilarious that the shark "eats" the Valentines?

Shark Valentine Card Box

You can find out how I made this Shark Valentine Card Box at MollyMooo Crafts!

And if you're looking for 3 other cute Valentines day crafts, check out the links below!

• Super adorable Valentine glasses
• "High Five" Valentines
• Kiss-tastic wrapping paper

Let's keep in Contact!

You can always find other fun ideas on my Pinterest, Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter accounts!  (Or subscribe to my email mailing list by filling out the pink bar at the top of your screen.)


Happy making friends!

The Snowy Day Shadow box

Howdy, friends!  Today the Creative Preschool Collaborators and I are sharing 5 fun Winter-themed preschool activities and crafts!  So be sure to scroll down to the bottom of the post for other great ideas!

The Snowy Day Shadow Box  

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Ezra Jack Keats' book, The Snowy Day, has always been a favorite of mine.   His illustrations are simple, charming, colorful, and graphic.  He really captures the magic of a winter snowfall.  Plus, I love that he supports multiculturalism and made his main character a young black boy.  So when I found out that this week's theme was Winter, I was excited to read this book with Chuck and combine it with a craft.  

Valentine, You ROCK MY WORLD!

Even though our Christmas tree is still up (I know, I know, I haven't the heart to take it down), my mind is currently on Valentine's Day and all the lovely crafts that go along with that.  Last year we made adorable heart shaped glasses and DIY Coffee and Candy Gifts.  This year I'm challenging myself to think of 10 easy funny, pun-y crafts that say Happy Valentine's Day!

Here's my 1st attempt!

Funny Pun-y Valentine's Day 1:  

"Valentine, You Rock My World" Rocks 

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DIY Star Washer Ornaments

Enjoy making things?  Looking for a fun gift to give a DIY-loving friend?  

How about these Star Washer Ornaments!

These lovely hardware ornaments are super easy to make and will look great on the Christmas tree too!  You can check out my full tutorial on DIY Candy today!

And here are 3 other easy DIY Ornaments!

• Felt and Milk Jug Ornaments
• Hand and Feet Salt Dough Ornaments
• Perler Bead Snowflake Ornaments

Let's keep in Contact!

Like this idea?  You can always find other fun ideas on my Pinterest, Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter accounts!  Or, just sign up for the weekly newsletter in the pink bar at the top of the site.

Happy making, friends!

Paper Plate Haircuts (Scissor Practice with Kids!)

Does your child have a fascination with scissors?  If left alone, Chuck would probably take a pair of scissors to everything.   Clothes, hair, yarn, paper, wood.... the Christmas tree.  (I've caught him on multiple occasions trying to cut our table.  Eeek! )

Today I've teamed up with the Creative Preschooler Team to share 5 fun ways to sharpen your preschoolers' scissor skills!  (Hee, hee.  Did you get it? Sharpen?  Wah wah wah.)

Scissor Practice:  Paper Plate Haircuts 

DIY Toy Car Ornaments

We have a TON of toy cars, trains, and trucks over here.  (Chuck's kinda got a thing for transportation toys.)  And lots of them have open windows.  I was staring at them the other day and realized... wouldn't they make fun (and cheap) ornaments?

DIY Car Ornaments

Paper Christmas Trees (template included)

Ok.  I know, I know.  I have a small obsession with mini Christmas trees.  I've made Christmas tree advent calendars, trees from pipe cleaners and cardboard, and mini paint chip Christmas trees.  So today's post probably won't come as a surprise to you.  But I just had to share these trees because they're so cute!  And...there's a twist!

We'll be staying in Cali for Christmas this year, so we won't see our family and friends on the East coast.  I wanted to share some Christmas cheer with them, so I made a bunch of Paper Christmas Tree Packs to go into their Christmas cards!   Each pack contains all the materials needed to make a lovely paper Christmas tree!

Paper Christmas Tree Packs

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Pin the Nose on Rudolph Game

Are you looking for a simple way to entertain the kids during the holidays?  Well, today our Creative preschool group has 5 great Christmas activities to do with the kids!

Recently I shared the story of Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer with Chuck.  He seemed to like Rudolph a lot, so I whipped up this super easy Pin the Nose on Rudolph game from us to try out.

Let's Pin on Rudolph's Nose!

Free Christmas Coloring Sheets

I've been seeing lots of  beautiful Christmas coloring sheets online lately.  I love doodling and wanted to make one for the blog....but things got pretty busy during the holidays.  (Our Aussie family is visiting us AND I'm making paper Moravian stars for a friend's wedding!)  So I didn't have a chance to doodle some coloring sheets till now.

Free Christmas Coloring Sheets

These 2 coloring sheets contain ornaments (or gift labels)  that the kids can color and then hang onto the tree.  

Perler Bead Garland

The Perler Bead holiday crafting continues!  A couple of days ago I shared how to make these super easy Perler Bead Snowflake ornaments.  Today I'm over at DIYCandy sharing this quirky and unique Perler Bead Holiday Garland!

Perler Bead Holiday Garland

You just need 2 materials:  Perler Beads and Zip ties!

(And if you like the adorable Christmas trees in the photo, you can find the tutorial for mini Christmas trees here.)

Hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving, friends!  We're going black Friday shopping today with family!  Wish us luck!

Let's keep in Contact!

Like this idea?  You can always find other fun ideas on my Pinterest, Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter accounts!  Or, just sign up for the weekly newsletter in the pink bar at the top of the site.

Happy making, friends!

DIY Perler Bead Snowflake Ornaments

Every year I try to make a couple new Christmas ornaments for the tree.   So far I've made hand and feet salt dough ornaments and  felt and milk jug ornaments.  This year I used Perler Beads and pipe cleaners to create easy snowflake ornaments!

Perler Bead and Snowflake Ornaments

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These were so incredibly easy to make and the colors make me happy.  Keep reading to see how you can make some of your own!

Poppable Wrapping Paper (DIY Gift Wrapping Rockin' Art Mom Style!)

Are you looking for creative ways to wrap your holiday gifts?  Well, today I've joined forces with fellow Rockin' Art Moms to share several imaginative and unique ways to wrap your holiday gifts!  (So be sure to check out all the rockin' holiday ideas below!)

Because we always seem to have an abundance of bubble wrap lying around, I put our excess to good use and made this modern, poppable holiday wrapping paper! 

Popping Holiday Wrapping Paper!

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I'm all about easy holiday crafts- like these paint chip Christmas Trees,  easy DIY Reindeer Headbands, and mini pipe cleaner and cardboard Christmas trees.  Today's wrapping paper idea is  super simple, colorful, and fun!   The recipient of your gift will get a kick out of popping the bubbles!

Candy Mosaic Art with Kids

Do you still have leftover Halloween candy?  Eeek. We do.  This week's Creative Preschooler theme is food!  With Chuck's current aversion to painting, I thought it would be fun to use our excess candy and make art with it!  So we made ourselves some lovely, colorful candy mosaic art!

Make Candy Mosaic Art with Kids!

It's always special to make art with non-traditional materials.  Some of my favorite food-art projects include our colored salt art, tortilla art,  gumdrop flowers, cornstarch sidewalk paint, and homemade watercolor paints!

Make Mini Christmas Trees (For free!)

Here's a super easy way to decorate your home for the holidays! 

Make a bunch of mini Christmas trees!

(Bonus- All the materials are free!)

DIY Colorful Shoelaces!

Lately I've been thinking about super simple Christmas gifts that kids could make for their friends.  Last year Chuck used Sharpies to make his own Sharpie Tie-Dye Shirt.  This time I thought I'd have a turn using Sharpies to turn plain white shoelaces into cute and colorful shoelaces!

DIY Colorful Shoe laces

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This was a super fun project with colorful and unique results!

Let's get started!

Easy Christmas Tree Advent Calendar

Christmas crafts? Christmas crafts?  Ok, I haven't completely gone bonkers... it's just that the stores have started putting out their Christmas things... so I wanted to join in on the fun.  Last year I had a lot of fun Christmas crafting (remember the village made from Plaster of Paris?)  This year I fell in love with all of the beautiful colors of paint swatches from Home Depot... so I took a bunch home (shhhh, don't tell anyone) and made a bunch of cute paper Christmas trees with Chuck.

Then I wasn't sure what to do with our little army of trees.  At first I was going to turn them into a garland of some sort, but then realized that they would make for a really simple and modern take on a DIY Christmas Advent Calendar!

Easy Christmas Tree Advent Calendar!

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Make your wheels glow in the dark! (And create some lovely modern art too!)

Do you like playing with glow sticks?  I love fall, but gosh, it gets dark outside so quickly!  I hate being cooped up inside.  What's a mom to do at night?  Well, we've tried embracing the dark by making a DIY Glowing Jellyfish Costume and drawing glowing designs on our skin.  Recently we also brought out our glow sticks and wove them into the wheels of Chuck's bike.  (I was inspired by Meri Cherry's awesome glow in the dark Dancing Ballerina Tutus!)

The activity was a hit!

Make Glow in the Dark Wheels!

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Yup.  This was a super easy activity that didn't cost very much to do and required very little set up  Plus, it got us outside and we made some beautiful glowing art.

Yup, you could say that the activity gets "glowing reviews" from our whole family?  Get it? Hee hee hee.

Ok.  Here's what we did!

CLOSED- Giveaway Post!!! Win $100 credit to Minted.com!

I’m super-duper excited for today’s post.  *Insert girlish squeal here.* Today Minted.com and I are excited to be offering one lucky reader $100 credit to Minted.com.   Yup.  It’s giveaway time!  It’s giveaway time! 

I’ve wanted to say a big “Thank you” to y’all for your support for a long time now.  So when I was contacted about doing a giveaway, I jumped at the chance because it meant that one of you could win something nice.   

This is a one awesome giveaway.  Minted.com is a beautifully curated online store that sells seriously gorgeous stationary and artwork.  I go goo-goo when I scroll through the pages because everything is so lovely and special.   In fact, here are four of my current favorite items…   

    

Hee hee hee!  This Yeti or not Christmas card is uber cute.  (And bonus- they're currently offering 20% off their holiday card selection until 10/6!  Score!)

Ok....So apparently I have Christmas cards on my mind, but how could you not love this partridge in a pear tree card?  (Did you sing the words like I just did?)

We're still struggling to decorate Chuck's new big boy room.  So this poster and this poster totally caught my eye. 

Did you know that they have wedding cards too? A couple of my girlfriends are getting married, so I have weddings on my mind.  This lovely floral chalkboard invitation is just gorgeous. 

Now if you'd like the chance to win $100 credit to Minted.com, here are all the details:

This giveaway is open all readers worldwide.  (Yay!)  Here’s what you could possibly win:

• For US readers: 
• $100 credit
• Free FedEx Ground shipping on everything except art
• For the international readers: 
• $100 credit
• Free international economy shipping on everything except art
• However, you have to pay your own country's duties/customs 

To enter the giveaway

1. Visit Minted.com and find your favorite item from the store. 
2. Visit my FB page and leave a comment on the 9/16 Giveaway post with your favorite item. 

That’s it!  The giveaway will close midnight Thursday (PST) and I’ll announce and contact the winner via Facebook by Friday morning. 

Good luck friends!  

This is a sponsored post.  But all opinions are mine.  I received $100 credit to give to one lucky reader.  I'm super glad that I did. :) 

Make Prehistoric Rock Art with Kids

Some of my fondest memories of History classes were times when teachers assigned projects instead of tests.  In 5th grade my friends and I did a presentation on the first transcontinental railroad.  I still remember wearing costumes and using tea to age our documents.  In 9th grade we shot a soap opera style video featuring King Henry the Eighth's wives.  It was fun to write and film... and even more hilarious to watch.   (Picture bad high school acting mixed with Monty Python style humor.  Yup.  Good times.)  Honestly, I don't remember much else from History classes (ack, sorry previous teachers!) but these projects shine brightly in my memory. They were fun to make and really made history come alive.  Hopefully today's craft will help do that for your kids too!  If they're interested in prehistoric times or art history, then this Prehistoric Rock Art Craft is for them!

Make Prehistoric Rock Art with Kids

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The techniques used to make this rock art is pretty much the same that I used to make this super cute mini Plaster of Paris Christmas village.  So if you liked doing this craft, check that one out too.

Ok. Now let's make some rock art!

4 Easy Bell Crafts for Kids

Right now we're in the middle of packing.  Not going to lie, our apartment is looking like it's inhabited by crazy people.  So my posts for the next month will probably be fewer and the crafts will be much simpler.  This brings me to today's topic:  crafting with bells.   I love the sound of jingle bells.  They remind me of Christmas, the cold, and reindeer.  I know it's July and Christmas is miles away... but you can craft with jingle bells all year round?  Right? Right! Here's how we've crafted with jingle bells:

4 Super Easy Bell Crafts for Kids

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