Gorgeous Accordion Fold Fall Paper Leaf Banner

Today we're continuing with the theme of easy fall crafts.  Couple of days ago I shared this really beautiful Sewn Leaf Art project that I made with my preschooler.  Today I just wanted to share this gorgeous folded paper leaf banner.

I came up with the idea after reading some fall-themed books with my son.   Seeing all the beautiful colored leaves in the books made me miss the fall leaves back on the East coast.  And then it hit me- why not make our own?  Bring a bit of fall to our forever-summer state.   And so, my son and I got to making and painting together.  The results came out so beautiful that he insisted we hang the banner up in his room to spruce it up.

Sharpie Tie Dye Shirt

It's Monday and we've finally started returning to our normal sleep schedules.  (Yes!)  And now that we're back and settled in, I realized that Easter is right around the corner.  Yikes.  Is it April already?  It totally snuck up on me this year. So here's my first semi-Easter related tutorial:   Sharpie Tie Dye Shirt

Wait, what does this shirt have to do with Easter?  Well, kids seem to wear cute, colorful outfits on Easter.  (See last year's DIY I heart Peeps Shirt.)   A friend graciously donated a bunch of clothes to us and one of the items was a blank white shirt.  It screamed "Paint me, paint me."  And so Chuck and I used it to make this year's Easter shirt together.  Keep reading to see how we made it!

DIY Magnetic Fishing Game

Currently, one of Chuck's favorite books is 10 Little Fish by Audrey and Bruce Wood.  It's a cute book about subtraction.  Kids count colorful fish on each page as they leave one by one.  And (my favorite part), it has a fishy romance at the end (What can I say?  I'm a closet romantic... tee heee hee.)  To accompany his love for fish, we recently made this DIY Magnetic Fishing Game. 

DIY Magnetic Fishing Game

It's cute and colorful and really fun to make and easy to play.  Want to make your own fishing game?  Keep reading to see how we made ours! 

How to do Flower Pounding

Happy Earth Day everyone!  How's the weather where you are?  It's slowly getting warmer and sunnier over here, so Chuck and I have been taking nature walks around our neighborhood.  I was surprised to see so many tiny flowers blooming.  (Nature is so resilient, isn't she?)  Chuck really loved seeing the colorful blossoms too.  We ended up picking quite a few and bringing them back to do some flower pounding. 

How to do Flower Pounding With Kids

This craft basically involves hitting flowers (or grass or leaves) with a hammer or rock to release their pigment.  As you can probably guess, it was a big hit with the little guy.  (Sorry downstairs neighbors!)  Keep reading to see how we pounded our flowers!

Corn Syrup Paint

Are you looking for a paint that's super pigmented and remains glossy looking when it's dry?  Well then this corn syrup paint is for you.  Chuck and I whipped up a batch of this glossy paint the other day in our kitchen.  Then we had loads of fun trying it out.  The paint is edible (although you probably don't want to eat it), has a consistency  thicker than regular paint, and looks like shiny enamel when it dries.  Intrigued?  Check out the results!

Make Glossy Corn Syrup Paint

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Oooooh.  Pretty.  So far we've made homemade sidewalk paint, homemade watercolor paints, and cornstarch toddler paint ... but none of those stand up to the gorgeous results of this homemade corn syrup paint.  The bright colors and gloss are fabulous.   (Yes.  I used the f-word.)  And ready for the best thing?  You could probably whip up a batch of this stuff tonight with ingredients and materials already found at home.  Let's get painting!

Make Sugar Cube Sugar Skull Art with Kids!

Looking for a fun Day of the Dead Sugar Skull Craft to do with the kids?  How about this sugar skull process art activity?  Different, everyday materials are combined to create a piece of unique and lovely artwork!

Sugar Cube Sugar Skull Art

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Make Pasta Frames with Kids!

Ah, pasta.  It's cheap, always in your cupboards, yummy...and a GREAT crafting material!  Today I'm super excited because my fellow Rockin' Art Moms and I came up with 14 super fun, beautiful, and easy pasta art projects that you can make with your kids!

And... *drum roll please* we want to see YOUR pasta creations and we're also hosting a GIVEAWAY too.  Yippee! So definitely check out the bottom of the post to see the giveaway details and all the other ladies' awesome posts.

Chuck and I decided to use our pasta to decorate painted picture frames!

Make Pasta Frames With Kids!

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"One in a Melon" Father's Day Card

Father's day is coming up!  We're gearing up over here by making cards and buying hubby yummy things to eat.  Yesterday I shared this super rad and easy to make toilet roll Father's Day card.  Today I'm sharing a punny Father's Day card with you.  It's a watermelon card (with matching watermelon envelope) that reads "Dad, you're one in a melon!" inside.

"One in a Melon" Father's Day Card

(Hee hee hee, so punny.)

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Chuck LOVES eating watermelon and hubby enjoys my punny humor, so this was a perfect card to make.  We had lots of fun painting the card and drawing inside.   

Halloween Skull and Ghost Soap Carvings

Looking for a super unique Halloween or Dia de los Muertos craft?  A couple of weeks ago, we tried our hand at designing, carving, and floating Ivory Soap Boats. It was so fun and easy. Ivory soap is the perfect medium for beginning carvers because it is airy and soft. (It's also relatively inexpensive! Bonus!)

Today's sugar skulls and ghosts are a bit more detailed than boats, but the results are so cute. I definitely recommend trying out this soap carving activity with kids of all ages. They are sure to have fun.

How to Carve Skulls and Ghosts from soap!

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Homemade watercolor paints

Yesterday it rained a whooole lot.

Luckily, my homemade watercolor paints finally set (after two days of waiting), so Chuck and I spent the morning painting.

Overall, the directions I used were pretty good, but I made two changes:
1.  I only used half of the materials recommended... and I still had plenty of water color paints.
2.  I added drops of food coloring to each of the ice cube trays.  (Looking back, maybe I should have compensated for the extra liquid by adding a bit more cornstarch to shorten my drying time.)





As you can see, Chuck enjoyed painting.  He also enjoyed repeatedly dipping the Q-tips into the water... and sneakily trying to drink the dirty water.  (Ick.)  I probably had more fun painting than he did because I was so delighted that the paints actually worked.

Here are our two joint paintings:

The paints weren't chalky when they dried.  We'll probably cut up the cards to make a birthday card for a niece.  Right now the leftover paints are sitting in the fridge.  We'll keep using them throughout the week because I'm curious how long they'll last.    

UPDATE:  5/24- I pulled the paints out of the fridge yesterday and they were rock hard.  I was worried, but after I didn't need to be.  After adding a couple drops of water into each well, they became paints again.  The colors didn't seem as vibrant as before, so Chuck and I ditched the q-tips and just used our fingers to paint. We got some lovely results.  Now they're back in the fridge again, and I'll pull them out in another couple of weeks to see if they last.

Have you ever tried to make homemade watercolors before?

Rainy Day Process Art

We got rain!  We got rain!  Whoopie!  This was a pretty big deal here in SoCal because we've been in the middle of a drought for a looooong time. Since I love trying easy art projects with Chuck, we took advantage of the rain and collaborated with Mother Nature to create some beautiful rainy day process art.

Let's Make Rainy Day Process Art!

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This was a really fun and easy art project.  I really enjoyed it because we didn't concern ourselves so much with the final product.  Instead, we just really enjoyed making art together and then watching Mother Nature add her bit too.

Here's how we made our rainy day process art!

Mathy Mother's Day Jewelry

Mother's Day is coming up!  So of course, fun kid-made gifts have been on my mind!  Last week we made these darling egg carton flower pins.  I thought they would go great with some lovely kid-made jewelry.  But of course, there had to be a twist!  (A math twist that is!)

Let's Make Mathy Mother's Day Jewelry!  

3 Easy Preschool Robot Art Ideas

Does your child love robots?  My preschooler loves them!  We regularly speak in robot voice and robot dance around the house. So today I'm adding to our growing list of Preschool crafts and activities with these 3 easy robot art ideas!

3 Easy Preschool Robot Art Ideas

Corn Husk Paint Brushes

Last week my sister brought over a bunch of corn.  I roasted them in the oven with their husks on and they were yummy.   But as I cleaned up, I kept wondering if there was anything I could do with the discarded husks.  Last summer I used my husks to make a corn husk doll.  This time I tried my hand at making some corn husk paint brushes, since Chuck has been so keen on painting lately.

Corn Husk Paint Brushes

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Last time he really enjoyed making abstract art with cardboard.  This time he found it funny to paint with brushes make from food.  Now if you're eating a lot of corn too, your kids might like trying out this activity too! 

DIY Mod Podge and Tissue Paper Spell Book Craft

I love Halloween crafts and I especially enjoy making Halloween crafts with kids In today's project, I'll show you how the boys and I transformed old books into spooky spell books using items from around the house. This upcycling process was fun and the results were creepy and perfect for Halloween!

How to Make a DIY Spell Book with Kids

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Two Chinese New Year Dragon Crafts

Ready for a fun Chinese New Year Craft?  Chinese New Year is one of those really fun holidays that I enjoyed celebrating as a kid.  Yummy food, wearing new clothes, red envelopes filled with money, and watching cool dragon and lion dancing?  Come on, what's not to love?  Since the holiday is just around the corner, I showed Chuck some lion dancing videos (Youtube to the rescue!) and then thought it'd be fun if we did some dragon crafts together:

Two Chinese New Year Dragon Crafts

Little background about me- Growing up I always felt like a "twinkie."  Yellow on the outside, white on the inside.  You see, I looked Asian, but I didn't always feel that way.  Now that Chuck's getting a bit older, hubby and I are trying to figure out how two twinkies like us pass down their cultural traditions. (Ehh... it's a work in progress....)

This craft is one way that we're trying to pass down our tradition.  And, in the interest of full disclosure, Chuck really enjoyed making the handprint dragon.... but he wasn't too keen on coloring my paper bag dragon pieces.  However, once I colored and glued everything down for him, he enjoyed playing with it like a puppet.

So, do you wanna see how we made these two dragons?  (I've got templates too!  Ooh la la!)  Keep on reading!

(And if you like this craft, definitely check out this dancing Chinese Dragon Puppet.  It actually dances and is made from recycled materials!)

40+ Projects that combine STEM with Art!

Seems like everyone's talking about the importance of STEAM (science, technology, engineering, art, and mathematics) these days. And hey, I get it.  We live in a highly technological world that's rapidly advancing in all sorts of new ways.   We want our kids to be be creative and adaptive problem solvers.

But maybe you're like me and you deeply love arts and crafts.  They're your jam.  And maybe you're unsure how to dive into all this STEAM goodness.  Hey, I get that too.  Hopefully today's post will help.  In this post I sharing over 40 ideas for arts and craft projects that also happen to incorporate STEM ideas.  Yup.  Here are some of my favorite artsy crafty posts...which also happen to have a little STEAM-y oomph to them!

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Leprechaun Hat Headband DIY

I'm not Irish. (Surprise!)  But I appreciate St. Patrick's Day because it gives me the opportunity to wear green and cute Leprechaun gear.  So today's craft is a DIY Leprechaun hat headband that was made from... wait for it.... toilet paper rolls and cereal boxes!   

Yup!  Today we're making our very own Leprechaun hat!

Keep reading to see how we made this little Leprechaun hat headband!

Make Tricycle Circle Artwork with Kids!

When I set up today's preschool art activity, my husband thought I was crazy.   Really.  He thought I finally inhaled too many craft paint fumes, fell off my rocker, and floated away to la-la land.

To be fair to him, it really WAS a giant art activity.  But I was still surprised by his reaction because he's already seen me do messy activities  (like making jello brains), slimey activities, and fairly large scale art activities (like this GIANT DIY scratch board).... so really, in the grand scheme of things, what's the big deal with making....

GIANT TRICYCLE ARTWORK!

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Tape Resist Ant Art!

Are you going buggy over spring?  Well, then today the preschool collaborators and I have 5 preschool bug activities that you'll absolutely love.  We've been digging ants lately, so I thought it would be fun to combine art and science to make some tape resist ant art!  

(And if you're looking for even more bug crafts, check out these egg carton bugs and my
fluttering butterfly craft!)

Tape Resist Ant Art!

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