Crepe Paper Rainbow Collage

We're stuck in this funny place: winter but not really winter at the same time. Very little snow outside but enough so that we can not go out without snow pants. Too cold to really spend the day out there, but nice enough to feel like we have to get outside for something. Everything is brown, white, and gray. So this week we've decided we need to add some color to our world which has included some fun rainbow play.

Last year around this time we made St. Patrick's Day Windsocks using crepe paper streamers, and as we still have the crepe paper, we put it to use again.

For this project we not only used the crepe paper, but another favorite material: contact paper. We've used contact paper to create a rainbow before too, in an original Sticky Rainbow Collage project. For this collage we used a similar process, although we knew we wanted it to hang the finished product in the window. 

4 Ways to Explore Symmetry at Home

We're really excited to be participating in the Cool Maths series hosted by Peakle Pie, which is continuing for the entire month of July. Each day this month bloggers in this series will be sharing great and practical ideas for how to explore math at home, and make it fun!

We're often doing math at home, sometimes as a project or game but more often it is just part of our daily experiences and conversations.

This week we started exploring symmetry. To introduce the topic, we explored it in four different ways.

Symmetry is a geometry term. The symmetry we explored focused on the idea that a shape or object can have a line of symmetry. When an object is folded in half, or you visualize a line going down the center of an object, you can see that the other half exactly matches or mirrors the first half. 

Four Seasons Wheel

Last week we shared our post for 10 Books to Read to Learn about the Year & the Four Seasons. To extend from our reading we created this fun project one day when Little Cousin was here visiting too.

Four Seasons Wheel

We created a similar wheel this summer at our Preschool Summer Camp with a weather based theme, so this was also an extension from our summer project.

Halloween Sticky Collage

It's October, which means it's that time of year where our family is pretty excited to be getting ready for Halloween! It's definitely a top family holiday. 

Halloween Sticky Collage

This year we were excited to participate in the Halloween Read + Play blog hop. Over 25 bloggers each picked a favorite halloween book and have paired it with a fun activity or project, there are some great ideas in this series!

For our project we chose the book Pumpkin Eye by Denise Fleming. The story is filled with fabulous rhymes, a catchy rhythm, and helps the reader imagine they're on the street trick-or-treating for the evening. 

After we read the book, we created our own halloween street using the "sticky collage" approach. We call it a sticky collage because the base is contact paper, which allows little hands to stick the items to the collage without needing glue. We've enjoyed several other types of sticky collage before. 

Quick Pick & Project of the Week: Seeds! Seeds! Seeds! Picture Frame

We've been a little busy with Little Brother being sick this past week, and have not had a lot of time to share what we've been up to. But we did have some time this week to still have a little fun. One of our projects of the week involved creating this seed collage picture frame as part of our Quick Pick & Project of the Week posts.

We recently found Seeds! Seeds! Seeds! by Nancy Elizabeth Wallace at our local library and we are really enjoying it. Not only does it give kids great information on how seeds grow, are different, may be used for different things, and what they need; it also gives several different ideas for projects right in the book! Buddy, the Little Bear, receives a special package from his grandfather with five bags. In each bag there is a different seed activity or project for Buddy to do. 

For our project we decided to create a seed picture frame just like Buddy creates near the end of the story. 

Earth Day Collage and Brainstorm

We've continued to explore Earth Day this week and the idea of taking care of our Earth. 

We enjoyed creating this Earth Day collage and then brainstorming ideas for how to care for Earth. We used paper from our scrap paper collection to create a torn paper collage and silver permanent marker to write our ideas around the world. 

Sticky Rainbow Collage

This is definitely the time of year when we need a little color in our world. It feels like it will be forever until spring arrives. As we were in search of a little color, and I was feeling inspired by all the St. Patrick's Day rainbows I see popping up online, I decided to set up a Sticky Rainbow Collage.

In January we discovered the fun of sticky collages, and now we've tried both a used wrapping paper collage and an arctic collage. But this was the first time I've drawn on lines for our work.

Roll A Snowman Collage

In the fall we had a lot of fun creating and playing with our Build A Monster Game. Reading the book All You Need for a Snowman inspired us to create a snowman version.

I decided unlike our monster game to make it an art project. As we rolled the dice we collected different pieces for a snowman. At the end of the game we glued our snowman together as a collage.

Arctic Sticky Collage

A few weeks ago we had a lot of fun with our Used Wrapping Paper Sticky Collage which we spontaneously put together. When a family member gave us a box of old National Geographic magazines I thought it would be fun to try a "themed" collage. As several of the magazines had polar animals, it seemed like it would be a good idea to try an arctic theme.

Used Wrapping Paper Sticky Collage

So after two great weeks of vacation we were ready to head back into routine today, except we wound up with a rainy "snow day." Most of the day we were happily entertained with books, board and card games, a special lunch, and an Eric Carle movie on Netflix. That was until late afternoon when we were still stuck inside and needed something new to entertain us.

Over the holidays I had saved some used wrapping paper for future projects.  I'd seen sticky paper collages online before and decided we'd combine the two.

The materials are simple: a large sheet of contact paper (we used a sheet of solid white contact paper as it was what we had,) and used wrapping materials. I cut up small squares of paper and strips of used ribbon. I also put out different scissors and shape punches. Big Brother was interested before I could even take a material picture.

Big Brother helped me peel apart the contact paper and we used tape to attach it to the wall sticky side out. Now the fun began. Big Brother cut up pieces of paper and strips of ribbon and stuck them onto the wall. Little Brother got interested too. 

In fact, Little Brother thought it was great fun!

In the end, Little Brother thought it was more fun to remove things from the collage so we created him his own collage with removable pieces so he could leave Big Brother's work alone. 

Both kiddos were entertained by the project, although Big Brother obviously stuck with it longer. He even came back to it a couple of times, so we're leaving the materials out over night for more play tomorrow. 

This post may also have been shared at some of these terrific link parties. 

Alphabet Adventures: G is for Golf

Big Brother is curious about all things sports related, and although my husband and I are not major sports fanatics, we're enjoying watching him explore a variety of different athletic endeavors. So when it came time for our "G Adventure" we knew mini-golf was a great summer activity. We had never taken him before but he's been really curious about golf as several family members play.

The Adventure

This weekend we headed a little south to a local mini-golf place. Even though we're not sports nuts, my husband and I both do enjoy a good game of mini-golf and have been known to get pretty competitive with one another in the past. We quickly realized that mini-golfing with a three year old was a whole different game.

Big Brother is probably a little more ready for the driving range with the swing he was using. But when not swinging he combined a mix of soccer, hockey, and pinball machine moves to make his way through the 18 holes. By the end he was getting a little closer to a swing that looked like a putt and a smaller number of hits. Little Brother eagerly watched from the sidelines. Mini-golf proved to be a lot of fun for all of us.

The Project

G is for Gold!

This was a quickie collage project which allowed Big Brother to create freely. He actually worked on it while I got Little Brother ready for bed. I put out gold glitter glue, gold glitter, and gold sequins. He pretty much went for the squeeze and dump. But, he sang as "G is for gold" the whole time he created it. 

And in a real family moment, I didn't gather a book ahead of time that fit with either part of the adventure. But I think in this adventure, it was really all about the doing!