Category Archives: Toddler craft

Taking Baby for their First Haircut and Other Adventures

by

Real life

What a change in the weather, back to grey skies and rain but it’s been a lovely week nevertheless. Last weekend started with a child-free day to myself, a rare treat and time for a haircut and spot of shopping. The weekend saw the arrival of mr sunshine and the building of a garden bench, then we had a lovely Tuesday seeing Hannah and Reuben from Mumsdays in the morning and a first haircut for Jossy too.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

At the Hancock

I was delighted to be handed her first curl for our tots memory book, it completes her book and though I feel sad that we’re drawing a close on the ‘baby’ months this little girl is a joy to be around!

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

The hairdresser was brilliant with Joss, I recommend going somewhere you go yourself, I love our stylists at my local salon, friendly and bubbly they really put Joss at ease, they asked her about her day and talked to her like she was a grown up which she loves, then when she was relaxed she had a quick trim to get her used to the experience, there were no tears, no need for distractions and a lot of smiles!

Blog life

In blogland I had a really popular post on making a summer garland this week, if you’d like to make one yourself details are here!

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Inspiration

I also lost a few hours this week on a bit of a bloggy jaunt which started with this beautiful book, following some of the blogs it mentions somehow led me to find the blog Junkaholique for which I am very grateful, what a treasure-trove of inspiration and loveliness!

homemade

- See more at: http://www.mumsdays.com/#sthash.mTNrKCA9.dpuf

Toddler Stained Glass Windows

by

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

This was a great idea that our local museum sparked off, toddler stained glass made from acetate, glue and lots of little pieces of torn up tissue paper.

Help your tot to spread pva glue all over one side of the acetate, then pop different coloured pieces of tissue paper over the glue, it’s fine to layer them up, you just don’t want it to be too thick to see the light through!

Leave to dry, then fold a piece of card in two and cut out a heart shape to overlay on the clean side of the acetate. Stick in place on the card and leave to dry, then hang in a window to let the light through!

For older kids you can chat about how glass is made and look at pictures of more intricate stained glass as we did at our art class.

Here’s one to get you started, I think this one is a good one to chat about!

Cake Angels Ice Cream Cone Cupcake Review

by

Goodies

The lovely folk at Cake Angels sent us an exciting parcel this week, look at all those sprinkles, a cake lovers dream! Ice cream cone cupcake anyone? I was intrigued!

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

How to

These cupcakes were so simple to make, just add water to the mix, fill the ice cream cones, and bake for 20 minutes. When they came out we let them cool, topped them with butter icing using the icing sugar from the pack, and then the fun part, decorations!

Sprinkles everywhere and a sticky child who really loved the vibrant colours! A stroke of luck that we had icecream themed cups from Polarn O Pyret’s party pack!

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

The proof is in the tasting of course, the cakes were light and airy and the chocolate flavour came through well, Joss loves icecream cones so that they stayed crispy was a big plus for her, and they were so simple for us to make together that I’d definately pick up another pack for a fun afternoon together!

What do you think?

Good enough to eat?

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

WP_005443

Thanks Cake Angels, we really enjoyed our treat!

Disclaimer: I received these goodies for the purposes of review, all views are my own.

Never to young for a rainy day craft box!

by

At school I loved a rainy playtime, stuff came out of the cupboard that you only got to see on a rainy day, the novelty factor was high!

I started a craft box for those days when Joss and I needed a distraction.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

It’s something new and different from the usual or for grouchy days where something she hasn’t seen for a while takes her interest and calms her. Teething days can be especially tough as she seemingly goes from one dangerous activity to another because she feels frustrated! On days like that I find it hard to concentrate so I have stuck a list in the box lid with ideas for messy play:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

It includes the ingredients for playdough and mentally prompts me to remember something I read a while back, that children are the opposite of gremlins and find water calming so if she starts to get a bit ‘gremliny’ there are some bath activities on there too!

how-to-really-love-a-child

Anyway, what’s in the box?

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

I buy the contents from charity shops, discount stores and supermarkets, if you’d like to stock your own here’s our rundown of the things we like:

Felt pens, pencils and crayons
Pipe cleaners
Pom poms
Tongs and small pots for picking up pom poms and sorting
Googly eyes
Nice pieces of scrap papers
Blank card
Glitter
Shredded paper
Sponges and paint rollers
Paint
Stickers

And what we currently have:
OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

We’ve been doing a lot of painting recently
OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

But we’ve also been exploring, mainly pom poms and pipe cleaners at the moment, pipecleaners pushed in the holes of a colander are a big favourite, as is picking up and sorting pom poms with tongs!

What’s in your rainy/grouchy day activity box?

Easter Egg Eyes Printable Game!

by

As part of my toddler play series we’ve been looking at new ideas for play at home, especially on a rainy day.

Joss and I have been drawing faces recently, as she knows most body and face parts now. We’ve been playing with a set of googly eyes I picked up in a local craft shop for 50p this week and have progressed from these drawn pictures and I’ve been making printables for her to put the eyes on.

They started off all over, now she’s starting to put them in the right place!

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

On my list of things I never thought I’d say – “put your eyes in the pot now Joss it’s tidy up time!”

I made an easter egg printable for her and thought others might like to use it either with googly eyes or just circles of paper with eyes drawn on! For older ones try a ‘pin the eyes on’ style blindfolded version!

index

Happy Easter Folks!

Children’s Centre Funding Proposals

by

This week at work I was engaged in responding to Budget Proposals around Adult Social Care. In doing some research and reading I came across a campaign urging me to respond to proposals around our local children’s centres. I have blogged about their importance before here.

The local campaign page can be found here:

The Facts

  • The proposed budget cuts may result in a 56% reduction in Gateshead Sure Start centre funding.
  • If these cuts go ahead some of Gateshead Sure Start centres may be closed.
  • It is not known yet what the criteria will be for closing centres; it may be down to areas of higher disadvantage or it may be down to current centre usage.
  • Sure Start staff members may face disciplinary action if they help with this campaign.

You however, can help!

I was doing some further reading around policy and development this week for a secondment I applied for recently, more on that later, but I came across a great read arguing for longer term thinking about children’s services, you can read more here

This was my response on Facebook:

As their parents face cuts in other areas of their lives, job losses, reduced family budgets and increasing prices the idea of cutting their children’s opportunities to access play and learning facilities that support their development, whilst often supporting parents’ mental health and opportunities to engage with other parents is not a sustainable long term solution. Children’s Centres should be seen as a long term community asset, and other options for their future explored. As a new parent last year I was offered no antenatal classes, there were no support services for new parents, and I had three health visitors in six months. The Children’s Centre baby massage class was where I learned to parent, the sensory rooms provided free opportunities to talk to other new parents and the brilliant parent outreach workers provided a friendly welcome and sympathetic ear. I fear for new parents who couldn’t access these opportunities, there is very little available for under fives outside of them.

Please do respond to similar consultations in your own local authority areas and get involved in the debate about funding our children’s futures, its vital we speak up now before it’s too late.

Play ideas meme

by

As you know I’m quite new to blogging but I have seen some brilliant linkies, including the weekly ones I take part in, from Podcast Dove and Ethan’s Escapades.

I love the sharing nature of blogging and wanted to get some ideas from other parents about toddler play ideas. We are short of space, on a budget and have a little girl who is very very active. I thought I’d start a toddler play Monday meme and seek my first tagee this week.

So here we go with our three questions:

What’s the activity?
How do we do it?
What did your little one enjoy about it?

What’s the activity?

We tried a spot of highchair cornflour gloop! We heard about this at our local Children’s Centre and thought the highchair could be a good place to contain the gloop til we source a cheap messy play tray!

How do we do it?

Mix two heaped tablespoons of cornflour with water until you have a gloop in a cup, or mix it straight onto the tray like we did for floury then wet fun! Then get your hands in, get little plastic toys in or a cheap paintbrush!

What did your little one enjoy about it?

Joss loved the gloop despite an uncertain start, look at her face! The gloop is so strange it looks wet but feels solid and you can move it around but if you try to scoop it it runs like water through your hands! Hard to describe, you’ll have to try it yourself!

image

Its pretty easy to clean up but do be aware it could be drain clogging so try to scoop as much as you can into an empty milk carton!

If you’d like to get involved and don’t want to wait to be tagged then grab my blog meme button! The next blogger to post next Monday will be In The Playroom – I’m looking forward to seeing what they come up with!

there and back 
<div align="center"><a href="https://www.headphonescheaponlinestoresale.com" title="there and back"><img src="https://i274.photobucket.com/albums/jj270/tobyct/meme.jpg" alt="there and back" style="border:none;" /></a></div>

 

Glitter and mess

by

image

Love a spot of messy play! Here are our top ideas for cheap rainy day entertainment!

1) edible glitter and squirty baby soap, a lethal combination so do this on bath night! Joss loved the sparkles and thought the squirty soap was hilarious! If they’re passed the stage of eating it shaving foam is a cheap alternative!

2) a 25p bottle of blowing bubbles, even tiny babies enjoy bubbles, Joss now says pop when they come back down!

3) have you checked out pinterest? Wow what a goldmine of ideas, this edible paint was great fun for me to make and play with too! http://pinterest.com/kristi_cck/edible-art/

4) an oldie but goodie, cornflour feels lovely and silky, add water and it turns solid and gloopy but when you scoop it in your hand it turns to liquid, who knew?! Joss loves the mess with this one!

5) and finally water play, Joss is enjoying her baths so much that we bought a big plastic sheet for in the kitchen, sat on the floor with her old baby bath and some random items (bath toys are boring, sieves, spoons, an empty bottle and little pots and measuring cups are waaaay more fun!

If like me you love to be out and about don’t feel trapped indoors get creative!

Crafting time – canvas quad for less than £10

by

Crafting time - canvas quad for less than £10

I finished Joss’ 4 canvases today, all with a seaside theme and incorporating photos from her first trip to the coast at South Shields and her first dip in the sea.

Bargain canvases at £4 for 4 and a craft magazine with all the trimmings made this a really cheap and easy activity, kept me busy for a few nights and will make a pretty display in Joss’ room!

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA