Carved Walnut Heads

At the farmer's market a few years ago there was a man selling carved walnut heads. They were the size of... walnuts, and they looked like shriveled up shrunken old heads. We have a walnut tree, so I kept meaning to try it, but I haven't gotten around to it yet. In the meantime, I found a few pictures of carved walnut things, enjoy...

Handmade Flower Paper

I totally love making handmade paper.Anyone else? I learned how to make it when we lived in Lynnwood. I used to dry it on my sliding glass door. I once printed out a picture of my kids on handmade paper, it looked so cool- printed in Sepia tones. When you dry it on the window it comes out really smooth. I like embedding flower petals and other things into it.

It's coming again....

The monthly crafting with 4 yr olds (even though I think they're all 5 by now) thing. Will I manage to pull it together for the little book things? We'll see.... I need to look for spray paint in my garage. And I need to pick up some ink for my printer to do the little picture things. Although it could work without the little picture things. I need to spray paint, though. several times, for each page and it needs to dry in between layers. Then we need some stickers, markers, paints.... forget the paints, class is an hour...... We can swing it. We'll use markers and stickers.

Recycled Crafts

I found a website for making Recycled Crafts. This is note-worthy because the Girl Scout Promise says we must "Use resources wisely" and "make the world a better place" Which includes, of course, beautifying it with old CD's and finding ways to reuse plastic beverage bottles. The fish are impressive, though- aren't they

Crafty new Theme

Duh- of course a craft blog would have a crafty theme. It doesn't, though. I'm going to change that. You'll See...

Acrylic Paintings on Watercolor paper

I don't know if painting is a craft, but it's an art and arts and crafts go together, and if you're a bad artist, applying paint could be a craft.

That said; I hate supplying kids with inferior art materials, like peeling tempera paints and cheap watercolors and papers that crumble.

My theory is that if they have high quality supplies and learn how to care for them properly (clean those brushes ,dammit for heaven's sake) they will be inspired and pleased by their work, and be proud to show it off and I will be proud to display it.

SO- these paintings were done with acrylic paints (quality, but cheap- they're thinner than real artists acrylic, and available in bottles at wal mart for 44 cents each) on thick watercolor paper and framed in some garage sale frames (12 for $1) Arranging them all on a wall together would be pretty, especially if you only supplied the kids with the colors that matched your decor.

Don'tcha hate it when a great plan falls through

I just totally failed the board book thing. Instead, we did spring yarn flower pictures. They're the 3rd installment of our 4x4 four season tiles. We've done Autumn (silk flower leaves in fall colors with crinkled paper tree trunks) and Winter (christmas trees in felt and glitter) and now Spring (the yarn flowers) If we do summer, I think we should do the blue hot glue for water, with sandpaper beach sand- maybe pre-cut the sandpaper into castle components so they can make little sandcastles.

Anyhow- we'll do the altered board books next time. I'm collecting stickers for it. I should request some of the budget funds for scrapbooking embellishments. Why do I always use my own resources? I don't even have resources right now. That's not true, I guess I always have resources. Still, I'd have more if I'd use the budget instead of my stuff.