Pumpkin Fun

I know that we are late on our game but we were finally able to work some fall crafting into our schedule. I found a simple tutorial to make some stuffed pumpkins from bandanas (link below). They looked easy enough and you can get two pumpkins from one bandana.

J is now my sewer :) She sewed the bandanas and got them ready for stuffing. It was a simple straight stitch and then you close the bottom and top with a running stitch.

Our finished pumpkins. We had a snafu - we didn't have a long enough needle to run the thread through the pumpkin but we improvised. Instead of running the thread through the pumpkin (and killing our fingers), we tied the pumpkins with yarn on the outside. They still turned out cute and now, we have four pumpkins that my tot can carry around the house without fear that he will drop and break one (true story).

We were able to go to a fall fest in our area and purchase several pumpkins at their pumpkin patch. I wanted them to do a small investigation of their pumpkins before we started carving/painting them. We used a free printable from Busy Me Plus Three (link below). Kaleb is discovering how many blocks tall is his pumpkin. He is amazed, can you tell?

J is making a face at her brother because he is informing her that his pumpkin is way bigger than hers.

I didn't really get a good picture of this but the highlight of the pumpkin investigation was to see their faces when they discovered that pumpkins float! J couldn't believe it.

Kaleb was sure since his pumpkin was heavier and larger that it would sink (even though J's floated). But, it did not sink. That was great. After our investigation, we will carve and paint our pumpkins but at least we had some Science fun ;) See You soon.

Links

Sadie Season Goods - has the tutorial that we used for the bandana pumpkins. You need a long needle but if you don't have one, you can tie your pumpkins with year like we did.

Busy Me Plus Three - free printable pumpkin investigation sheet from her TPT store.

My Projects

With the move to the house and all of the repairs we had to complete, it has taken me a while to work on the decorative items that I wanted to complete. The house still needs repairs but the list is getting shorter. Here are a few things I have been working on lately.

J chose a pink of all pinks color for her room. We decided to go with a butterfly theme and I wanted to make her butterfly curtains. I love how they turned out. I had to line the curtains which I didn't like doing but I think they turned out cute. I lined them with a sheet that I found at a thrift store and I bought the fabric with a coupon. Yay! So they weren't too expensive to make. I love the butterflies. You can't tell from the picture but only the bodies of the butterflies are sewn down so the wings will flutter (somewhat). My inspiration for the curtains came from this quilt by Shabby Fabrics.

Recently, I was blessed by some friends from church. We had a crafty weekend away from the kids. We ate, worked on crafty things, and then, went shopping at an awesome flea market. It was my kind of weekend! One of the projects I worked on was a name banner for J's room. It was a simple project but it turned out super cute. I hung in in her window.

J's room is small and she has plenty of stuffed animals. I found a white dust ruffle for a twin bed at a thrift store that was brand new. I made pockets for the one side of the bed that shows. The pockets will hold her stuffed animals and fluffy toys. This was an easy solution to add some more storage to J's room. I bought the fabric at JoAnn's. Kaleb was so impressed with the pocket dust ruffle that he asked for one of his own.

My last completed project was a banner for our sewing room. It says "Create." This was also simple to make and it just adds something to our sewing room until I have the money to add other things:) I found a pattern online and went with it. It doesn't take too much fabric, you could really use your scraps if you had some. I am able to get crafty. I have missed it so. I still have plenty of things to make for the house but I am crossing some things off the list. Hope you have time to be crafty today:)

You Are My Sunshine

There is a special song that my Mom sings to my children. Well, there is more than one special song but that post would take too long :) My Mom often sings "You Are My Sunshine" which my kids love. So, when I saw this on Pinterest one day, I knew that I had to make it for my Mom (and I just had to have one too). Sorry the picture is so dark, I couldn't get my flash to work.

This turned out super cute and I love it. My Mom loved it too! The hardest part of this was painting my newborn baby's toes and trying to get his foot print. I was doing this by myself and it is easier said than done. Kaleb and J painted both the background and the sun onto the canvas. I painted the letters then traced them with a black sharpie marker.
I added their names and also wrote them on the back along with the date and their ages. Simple. This is a simple gift that is easy to do but will be cherished forever.

A Year of Finished Projects

I have officially declared this year - the year of finished projects. I have a a basket full of unfinished projects - quilts, crafts, etc... - that I will finish this year. It started with finishing the nativity at Christmas. Yeah, it was technically last year but I feel the need to finish all of the projects that I have been working on. So, I am sharing some finished projects so far. The silly thing is that these weren't projects in my project bin. I saw them and just had to try them out. So, I actually added to the project bin but I also finished them, so I am back where I started, right? Here are my finished projects so far....

I saw this quilt pattern here and I knew that I could make it without the pattern. It was easy enough and I used scraps of fabric that I already had so the project didn't cost me a thing. It doesn't look exactly like the original but it turned out okay. It is a smaller version and is now hanging in my hallway.

This was something I saw on another blog and it looked easy enough to finish in a day. I made the pattern 50% smaller than the original. It was a lot harder than expected but I perservered and finished it. I can't say that I will be doing this type of piecing again. I used my scraps, actually I used the scraps from the Hungry Caterpillar quilt that my mom made for J. I knew I wanted it to be bright but for some reason, most of my scraps are pink. (I know why, I made J a duvet cover and it seems all I have is pink.) This is small and it turned out cute. But it was a pain to make. Two finished projects down and ? to go. I also had time to start the binding on my table runner and stuff some animal toys for Kaleb. I had a busy day today. I hope I can keep it going....and finish all of my projects without adding too many more.

Our Nativity (finally finished!!!!)

About two years ago, I found a pattern on Etsy for a felt nativity. I loved the simplicity of it as well as the ability for it to be loved by small hands without worry. So I ordered it and began the journey. It took two years and I finally finished it. It is not that the pattern was too difficult because it isn't. It was just that other things needed to be done or made and I just never could get it finished. Here is my homemade nativity:

a close up of baby Jesus, Mary and Joseph

the three Wisemen that I finished this year....

a final view with our nativity by our phone in the living room so little hands can play with it. I would like to add some freestanding sheep but not sure how I would do that since it wasn't in the pattern.





Seussmas!

I have a teenage daughter who absolutely loves Dr. Seuss. This Christmas I wanted to give her something she would (hopefully) cherish. I made her a Dr. Seuss tree. Some of the ornaments were just laminated books covers or finger puppets that I found. But I did make some from felt. I am pretty happy with how it turned out, I just hope my DD will love it.

I made a Cat in the Hat hat for the top of the tree and some mini bunting as garland around the tree.

Here is my Horton Hears a Who.

My Lorax trees, I think that is what they are called.

Green Eggs and Ham

The Grinch and his heart that grew...

Ten Apples on Top...

Thing 1 and 2...

and a quote for Dr. Seuss himself.

It was difficult to put together with my younger daughter around. I didn't want her to let the cat out of the bag so I kept telling her I was making a game. I think it turned out cute. Now, if I can find some Dr. Seuss fabric while in the states next year, maybe she will get a tree skirt.

Some Dr. Seuss Links....

2 Teaching Mommies printable unit on Seuss

Making Learning Fun printable activities

Seussville this is where I found the finger puppets

Crack of Dawn Crafts this is where I got the pattern for Thing 1 and 2

Oh, My Handmade tutorial for the mini bunting

Class Room Jr idea for the Lorax trees

Craft Snob top hat tutorial

Obseussed everything Seuss

Very Last First Time (part 2)



We are still working with our book, Very Last First Time by Jan Andrews. I was alittle slack in taking pictures, so please forgive me. We watched a video on how to make an igloo and then J created one with sugar cubes and glue. She left the igloo open so she could play with it.

In case you were wondering, we are going through a ballerina phase. She has worn tutus and tights all week. After J made her igloo, we experimented with an ice cube and some salt. We found that we were able to pick up an ice cube with some yarn and salt.

We painted with ice cubes that were colored with food coloring. A nice mess on our hands but fun!

Then we acted out the story, complete with ice hole and mussels to collect. We also learned about simple machines - the lever - and she is using a "knife" as a lever to pry the mussels from the rocks. We watched a video of ducks diving for mussels on the sea bed.

Keke asked me to make her a Red Riding Hood cape for Halloween. We don't celebrate Halloween but some of the girls are dressing up as princesses in the high school. My daughter wants to be different so she choose Red Riding Hood. I made her a cape from two polar fleece blankets and two t-shirt jersey sheets. I wasn't sure I would have time to visit the fabric district so I used what I could find here. J is modeling it for you as it is not quite done. I have to finish the hem. I altered the pattern to make it longer for Keke so I need to make some adjustments. The pattern and tutorial was free from Fleece Fun. Isn't she pretty?

It is not perfect but Keke really liked it. And the hood - it is soo large! I will post a pic of my daughter dressed up soon. We had a busy week but we are off to another book and a new location!

Very Last First Time Links

Walking by the Way has a great igloo idea but there is no way I could have saved that many milk bottles, especially since ours only come in one-liters!

My Little House in the City

Scienceray has the ice on a string experiment

YouTube a video of ducks diving for mussels

YouTube a video of a dissection of a mussel

YouTube how to make an igloo

YouTube an Inuit song

Time For Kids some information on Canada

HomeSchoolShare  my favorite resource!

Lentil (part 2)

Sorry this post is late - DH took the camera with my pics for this post and I had to wait for him to return. We were still wondering why the Statue of Liberty turned green and we found out it was due to pollution (the vinegar). We checked on our pennies and this is how they looked.

I think we will do another experiment to see if we can clean them up! The story of Lentil takes place in Ohio and J colored a sheet with the state bird and flower on it.

The musicians in the book couldn't play their instruments because Old Man Sneep was sucking on lemons. So we tried sucking on lemons as well. These are the faces we made.

This pic is alittle blurry but you get the idea! We also made lemon sorbet. I found a new mix in the baking section here and thought we should try it. It was actually good but it didn't make much.

We learned about the ear and our taste buds by reading about them in our body book and then creating mini books. Our book about the ear....

and the taste buds...

with J demonstrating where her tastebuds were. We discussed different tastes - sweet, sour, bitter, and salty. And Kaleb is demonstrating his use of taste buds... (don't worry I didn't let him eat it although he has eaten worse things) (he made this mess by the way, haha)

And we made our own homemade harmonica!

I made a simple craft this week. I have been seeing these pompom magnets used across the blogsphere and I wanted to make some as well. I brought the items back from America to do this and I finally took the time to glue them together. I bought some magnet disks from Michael's and a package of pompoms. I used Aleene's glue and we ended up with an open-ended manipulative.

J is creating a flower with them. We will use them to practice patterns, create pictures, letters, etc...

Cute and easy. I also finished a quilt this weekend.

Well, we are off to another book adventure! Smile.

Here are some Lentil book links:

Home School Share favorite place, I always try to go there first. They have great printables and lapbooks for free!

Exploratorium found the directions for our homemade harmonica.

Infantbibliophile she rowed about her adventures.

Outside the sandbox the colored water experiment in the wine glasses looked fun but I didn't have any wine glasses!

Youtube Lentil Video.

And if you want to make your own puff-ball magnets or print activities to do with them, Mama Jenn has some great links.

The Rag Coat (part 2)

We are still working with the book The Rag Coat by Lauren Mills. We are working with our shapes and I brought out our magnetic shapes board for J to create pictures on while I read.

As our daily read-aloud, I began Raggedy Ann and Andy - A Read Aloud Treasury by Johnny Gruelle. In addition to our daily reading of our FIAR book, I also read aloud from another. I chose this one because in The Rag Coat, Minna makes her own cloth doll from scraps of fabric and stuffing.

We also have been learning about how we breathe. In the book, Minna loses her father because of the Miner's Cough (known as Black Lung) and I thought it would be a good idea to learn about how we breathe. I found these paper models from a Scholastic book that I recently purchased for a dollar in their Teacher Express store which allows you to download all of their great books. Every now and then, they run an awesome sale with soo many resources for a dollar each! The book is Easy Make and Learn Projects: Human Body by Wynne and Silver. (the dollar sale has been extended until 9/24)

We also made a breathing vest from some craft paper (we don't have large paper bags here). I helped her color as she will only do so much.

and here she is uncovering her heart....

I love Scholastic books! Any chance I get, I bring games here from America. I take them out of the boxes and put them in ziplock bags for easier transport. The reason I bring games as they are extremely expensive here and I believe that kids can learn from playing them. My last trip to 'Merica, I came across a game from Animal Planet that was marked down at Toys'R'Us. I couldn't pass up the deal and I bought it. J loves animals and this game - Creature's and Features was all about animals.

I paid a small amount and she loves it. The way you play is that you choose an animal from the pile and have to place markers on what features this animals has - such as does it have...teeth, fur, feathers...does it lay eggs...is it awake at night? For every correct answer, you move your token up the board. We have learned quite a bit about animals and it was well worth the money.

I have been trying to pick one different game a week to play with J. This way we aren't always doing "book" stuff for school and it helps us to have fun. I will be bringing this one out again. Now, if you look closely in the picture, you will see two fabric pumpkins. They are small so you might have to look hard.

They are silly looking things but I found this post today on Fiskars and the weather was just a tad chilly, I was feeling like fall. I made these in about a half hour. J stuffed them for me. The only missing is the brown thread stem which I don't have the starch for or possibly the ribbon. I will work on that. I think they turned out cute for a quick sewing job. I also don't have the cute fabric but I used what I had on hand. I am thinking about making a bigger one and then using them for a centerpiece for the table, maybe with some candles and such. I won't be using then for a pincushion and I really think J is eyeing them to play with. She has requested a family of them! Here is a close up of one -

kinda cute, an extremely easy project. I leave you with my Kaleb....

He was busy reading his books and playing with his toys while we were doing school.