Tin can windchime

I love color. I love whimsy. I love things that are a little bit funky. And I LOVE doing activities with my kids. So when I happened upon this lovely little idea, I knew Big Sis DIVA and I had to get to crafting.

Tin Can Wind Chime.

Awesome!

I saved up some veggie cans and tuna fish cans. Cleaned them, sent them through the dishwasher and laid them out to dry. I am a bit of a worrier, so I took black electrical tape and covered the "open" edge of all the cans.

Then I set up the workspace and surprised Big Sis DIVA. We used spray paint for our project.

I allowed her to watch me paint the cans while she played on her swing set. I didn't want her to breathe in the fumes.

After the cans dried, Big Sis DIVA helped me use the hammer to poke holes in the cans (you know this was a riot, right?) and thread wire to hang our cans. Simple. fun. Exciting.

We now have a lovely little colorful funky piece of whimsy hanging on the swing set, a fine choice by Big Sis DIVA, that blows in the wind and makes beautiful sounds. Oh! Wait! We have no wind. It is a summer in Houston! Perhaps in the fall the whimsical tunes will accompany the whimsical appearance of our fun little craft!

Road Kill Easter chicks and other ugly toddler crafts

Critter2 and I spent another couple of nights in the hospital, but we are now home safe and sound and enjoying bed rest together with Baby DIVA. I still am working on fun and exciting crafts and activities we can do together, Momma and Baby DIVA, while butt sitting. This week I kind of blew off the letter theme for our projects and just went with the Easter theme.

Now let me preface these activities with a little learned fact. With an older child these could be performed just fine in bed while momma is bed rested. With a spunky 2 year old, well, take that 10 minutes of freedom you get from bed rest, blow off your daily shower and sit at a table to craft with your tot.

First up, Tissue Paper Eggs. Grandma was over visiting us and helping me keep control of one spunky Baby DIVA. This added some extra fun to this craft. I simply blew up a balloon, handed Baby DIVA a bowl of glue and a paintbrush and let her paint the balloon. Then I let her dig into a basket full of colored tissue paper I had torn up earlier in the morning while butt sitting. She covered the balloon with glue and then slapped on the colored tissue paper. Well, sort of. She really could care less. She thought this was awesome for about 3 minutes and then was ready to move on. I found the original idea Here, at the Imagination Tree, and have high hopes to attempt this project again next year.

Loving the glue

And interest beginning to fade

Grandma and Baby DIVA Crafting

Baby DIVA's creation, post loss of interest

Here is Grandma's masterpiece. She took her eggs and cut them in half. Then she made eggs, chicks and bunnies, out of glue and bread. Super cute! I was napping while she created so I am not sure how she did it, But Baby DIVA loves it!

Then we worked on another great project which H4L has named "Road Kill Easter chicks". I found this idea on a blog and then forgot what blog I found it on. So, if this was your idea let me know so I can give you credit. I worked the idea from memory too, so it might be a little off the original posters plan.

I took 3 paper plates. Traced Baby DIVA's hand prints two of them and cut them out. These will serve as the "wings". While I was cutting her prints out, Baby DIVA dug into the yellow paint and began to decorate the Chick body or the third paper plate. Then I gave her the wings and let her paint these too. After her masterpiece was "yellowed" up, we glued the wings in place and then covered the body of the chick with yellow feathers. And Voila...Road Kill Easter Chick.

Painting Yellow Chicks

Road kill Easter Chick

These were fun and simple Easter Crafts that gave Baby DIVA some fun without stressing out my butt sitting bed rested body. Now, she is two, we are not seasoned artists, but we had fun and these activities will both be on our list again next year, while not bed rested!

Snack Necklace

Baby DIVA and I have been doing a little project everyday. Some days it is as simple as sitting in the backyard naming off colors as we see them. Other days we make crafts or bake or dance and sing silly songs. Whatever it may be, I make sure to spend a minimum of 30 minutes to an hour uninterrupted each day giving Baby DIVA my undivided attention. No laundry, no phone calls, no Facebook, no tv, nothing. No interrupting mom and babe. Just time devoted to one another without distractions. This is a very important gift that I give my child, and I do my best to make sure she gets it almost every single day.

The other day we did a project and Baby DIVA had so much fun. she giggled and laughed and it tickled me so. It is a really simple project. Something that all of us moms, girls, humans know how to do. A project I kind of threw together last minute. The project was making cereal necklaces.

I took some string and plain old Cheerios's. And then we began to string the cheerios. Baby DIVA squealed with delight and promptly began to eat the cheerios off the string quicker than I could put them on. She looked adorable. Like a little puppy scavenging for treats, as she devoured each "bead" of the cereal necklace. She thought it was awesome. After a few minutes she grasped the concept and we worked together to finish the first necklace. She quickly put it around her neck and started eating. Giggling all the while.

It just tickled me so to have her react so well to such a simple idea. We had a ball making necklaces. We ended up making about 6 in all. And she was ever so delighted to show them off to H4L when he came home from work.

Christmas crafting...again

We are still at it. Christmas Crafting some more with Baby DIVA. Nothing fancy. Just fun stuff. And if you have ever crafted with a tot, you know it's a fun experience just in itself!

Here we have a handprint/footprint reindeer. Took us a while. Baby DIVA kind of ADD'd on me. First we traced her hands and feet. She thought it was cool but lost interest during the cutting phase. But was back and ready to rock and roll when she spied the glue and momma letting her use it.

Some more ADD moments can be seen here in this Santa. We started it and Yep Baby DIVA has showed no interest in finsihing. That is okay though. That is the fun of crafting with toddler right? Maybe we will finish it next year! LOL

And this one I can not take credit for. But I really wanted to share it with you. My friend Jamie of Love to Shop Mom, surprised Baby DIVA with this adorable Chritmas crafting shirt. Too dang cute huh?

12 days of Christmas

In hopes to keep Baby DIVA entertained during the hustle and bustle of the holiday season as well as to keep her from noticing we don't hit the park too often because it is a tad chilly, I have been trying to come up with fun crafty things to do indoors to peak her attention. Now we all know a 2 year old is going to have the attention span of OH about 30 seconds, so these are quick projects, nonetheless I find myself finishing them alone while she runs off to get into something she is not supposed to. AHH the life of a mom with a toddler.

Yesterday we completed our 12 days of Christmas project for this year. Simple really. I traced Baby DIVA's hand onto green paper and then cut out a bunch of her prints. We then took her hands and constructed a Christmas tree from them. I also cut out a few pink and blue ball ornaments and red candy canes and a single large yellow star from construction paper for the tree topper. Simple. Easy. She was entertained for a whole 2 minutes. It was grand!

We hung our masterpiece by the fireplace. It looks quite cute. Now come December 13, we will begin to place a construction paper present under the tree, one each day, for the 12 days of Christmas. An advent calendar of sorts. A craft that keeps on going. A little something fun for my Baby DIVA to do every day between now and Christmas.

I am feeling kind of BATTY!!!

Halloween is my favorite holiday. Always has been, always will be. AND now it will also always hold a special meaning as it is also my wedding anniversary. The last two Halloweens H4L and I have not decorated much. Two back I was on bedrest in the hospital with Baby DIVA. I do remember sporting some Halloween socks, but that was about the extent of "Decor" that year. Last year we were living it up VEGAS style for our nuptials at the Venetian in Las Vegas. So this year, it was really important to us to get back in the swing of things and express our passion for Halloween. And we have kept it tot friendly, because Baby DIVA does get a bit scared of the decorations; I mean she is not even 2! WE can't expect her to be all vampired out yet , right?

I wanted to add a special touch to our decor, so I busted out my crafting junk and went to work. I carefully cut, what felt like thousands of BATS, from black felt in two different sizes. We then attached magnets to the back and secured them to our garage door. A quick snip snip of the scissors on some yellow felt and we also had a "spooky" moon. Simple, elegant and FUN!!

Hello there Fall!

Yesterday, to celebrate the beginning of Fall, at least in theory anyway cause we do not really get fall here in Texas, Baby DIVA and I constructed a little fall project. We built a tree! And while building our fall tree our noses were tickled with the sumptuous aroma of Hot apple cinnamon, courtesy of a great Glad candle. The air outside was still quite warm here, however we didn't break 90 degrees. Holy Toledo!

Baby DIVA and I took a bowl of dollar store leaves, some butcher paper and Elmer's glue and began our masterpiece

I first drew a giant tree on the paper for Baby DIVA. Then I painted the whole area with the glue. Finally Baby DIVA slipped her hands into the bowl of leaves and started placing them all over the tree...and her...and the living room floor. Eventually we completed the project by placing 3 giant red apples, one for mom, dad and Baby DIVA, at the foot of the tree. She seemed to really enjoy this festive activity and got a kick out of having fall come right into the living room with the leaves. We even had a mini leaf pile that we "jumped" in on the couch. I guess you could say that is a Katy, Texas fall for you! Ha!

Happy Fall to all!

Salt glitters?

Baby Diva still eats EVERYTHING in sight. Nice. Does kind of put a damper on us trying to do some fun crafting projects. Not too comfortable handing her glue and glitter. So what is one to do? Especially when the "big kids" are doing some really fun and exciting crafting at the dining table?

Well pour out half a cup of salt and sprinkle in some food coloring.

Stir and mix the food coloring in well.

Lay out the salt on a plate and allow to dry for about 20- 30 minutes. And VOILA safe glitter for toddlers to play with! Store in sealed baggies for up to a month!

Stimulating Baby DIVA

Baby DIVA is very much into touching things these days. She loves to pet, smash, pat, pull, you name it. Our cats are getting a bit frustrated with this new found sensory game that Baby DIVA has developed. Among her bazillion trillion toys that she has for stimulation, I crafted up a little sensory board for her to "touch". I know it is simple, but she loves it. It was so easy to construct as well.

First I took a piece of cardboard and covered it with Hot Pink Zebra fabric, just for a little fancy flare. I then filled Ziploc bags with rice, almonds, and food colored water. I sealed the bags and attached with clear packing tape to the fabric covered board. I then found a little washcloth and attached this to the fabric board. I took our fabric rolly thingy (you know the lint remover) and pulled a sheet off, and then taped this to the board. And finally I taped a piece of aluminum foil to the board. Baby DIVA has 6 very different textures to touch, pat, push, pull and try to bust open :). She seems to be getting a kick out of this board and I am also taking the opportunity to try and teach her the words associated with the items on the board. It is a great cheap "toy" that I just put together from what we had lying around the house. So far we have gotten a ton of entertainment from it!

The Screams Ceased!

In recent weeks, Baby DIVA has reached that sparkling age where she knows that Momma has left the room, and she ain't so happy about it. A typical playroom moment consists of Me placing Baby DIVA in her playroom. Wee spend some time playing and then it happens, I have to go to the bathroom. Off I go, stepping over the clear view baby gate, and there she goes, "WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA". Immediate response from Baby DIVA and it does not stop until I am not only back in her eye site, but back in her playroom. And then she promptly resumes her playing and ignores me in silence. Fun times.

Seriously, what kiddo wouldn't want to play in this toy overload?

Well I accidentally came across a solution to our problem. During an intense round of peek-a-boo, utilizing the clear view baby gate and a blanket, I made the sudden discovery that when Baby DIVA can not see momma walk away through the clear view gate, she goes on about her business and plays ALONE in her playroom! HOLY TOLEDO! A MIRACLE! I can finally pee in silence.

The Clear View baby gate that has brought some many screaming issues!

So, I rummaged around in the craft room, because she is a DIVA and a simple blanket will not suffice. I came out wearing a martini apron and holding construction paper, tape, glue, scissors and a smile. Baby DIVA and I created a simple and cutesy little Flower scene in colors conducive to her playroom decor, wrote her name real big in silver sparkles and taped that bad boy over the clear view portion of the baby gate.

VOILA!

Completed little craftiness that ceases the screams!

Peeing in silence commenced. Baby DIVA talked to her little flowers and then toddled off to play in her playroom. I watched from around the corner holding a mirror so I could see the happy moment. It is pure bliss to be able to walk away to the bathroom for a moment without a full hysterical toddler! I just hope the flowers keep her smiling for many weeks to come!