A Rainbow Day

Hi all,
Sorry I've been away. My day time recreation has been dramatically cut by a little one with back to back colds and in the evening the computer is being used by my husband who is completing some post grad study. This is actually about two weeks old. We haven't had any playdough around here for a long long time but we finally got around to making a batch. This is the usual recipe. I don't add the food colouring until after it's cooked then Rainbow and I knead different colours into each portion. Rainbow requested we leave one portion white this time.

This is actually Moonshine's very first ever play with playdough. You can see how fascinated she was. I can't believe she's already rolling it (with chants of 'roll roll roll')!

Then as we already had the food colouring I decided to dye some new pasta for threading. Big pieces for Rainbow and little ones for Moonshine. Normally I put it in a jar and shake it but we didn't have any with lids so we ended up stirring it in a bowl. In this picture Rainbow is painting the food colouring onto the pasta. I did hear later, from Rainbow's grandmother (who is a kindy teacher) that they dilute dye with water and briefly immerse before spreading out to dry.

This is Moonshine having her first attempt at threading, onto a chopstick standing in a lump of playdough. A stationary pole is a good starting point. With Rainbow we then proceeded to the stiff texture of pipe cleaners (chenille sticks) before moving to shoe laces (or wool with tape wound around one edge)

Our Luna Park

One of our favourite things after visiting or doing something interesting is too relive it at home.
Here's our version of Luna Park. Luna Park is a theme park in Sydney right on the river next to the Harbour Bridge. This first photo isn't mine and I'm hoping it's Sydney as there is a second Luna Park in Melbourne. Here are our train people entering through the iconic Luna clown face.

Next they had a ride on the ferris wheel. This is one of my creations. This might sound strange but I've always wanted to build a ferris wheel.

Then on to the carousel. Another of my creations. The plate is secured to the yoghurt lid with a tack so that it can spin. The people are secured on to the carousel animals with rolls of sticky tape hence the crazy angle of the man riding on the frog.

Next a ride on Rainbow's roller coaster. Moonshine enjoyed spinning the above two rides but she particularly enjoyed screaming as she maneuvered the car down the steep incline.

Finally here's Rainbow's own invention. Coming soon to a theme park near you. It's called something like luminator and it's like a hovercraft that lifts off then flys around. The passengers can lie or sit in it.

Painting on Foil

I had planned to post this before we left but ran out of time..

About a month ago my nephew celebrated his birthday and the girls made him a transformer inspired robot card using aluminium foil that had been glued onto card then cut into shapes and arranged.

It got me thinking about whether you could paint on foil and get that look of applying gold foil. So here are the different methods we tried. You can skip forward to the end to see our most successful, though you do get some interesting effects in the other method!

Materials

All of these methods were suited to both girls (18m and 3 1/2) and used poster paint and aluminium foil. This is a great way of reusing aluminium foil after cooking. Just rinse, dry and use. I glued the foil on to card from cereal box to make it a little sturdier. You could get interesting effects from painting on foil then using it to wrap around 3D sculptures.

Method 1

Simply paint a picture on the foil. Sorry no picture you'll have to imagine.

Method 2

This time the girls completely covered the foil in paint then drew on a design using a cotton bud. We've used this method before on our glass cutting board and taken prints of it using paper so it was interesting to draw directly on to the picture.

Method 3

Crinkle the foil (perfect after baking potatoes), glue onto card and paint. This was a little more like what I'd imagined though Rainbow just saw it as a challenge filling in all the cracks.

Here is Moonshine. She just loves painting but you can't turn your back on her for a minute or it goes everywhere. Her painting shows the effect I was aiming for with the metal shining through.Method 4

This one we stumbled on by accident when I washed Moonshine's brush midway through a painting. If you use a very wet brush dipped in paint the paint pools in some areas and is repelled in others. I'm not sure why this happens perhaps someone can enlighten me.

Bush Fairies

Last week Rainbow and I made these little bush fairies using wooden beads for heads and the seeds, nuts and buds from our Autumn nature table. Rainbow chose the pieces and I hot glue gunned them together. It was a quick craft to enjoy in the little break between Rainbow and Moonshine waking from their afternoon sleep. Moonshine was quite interested in it as we hastily packed away when she awoke. Funnily I happily let her pick up and play with anything and everything when we're in the bush but won't let her play with these in fear they might fall apart and get consumed! It was really very enjoyable and this week I came home with pockets full from our Sunday trip "out bush" for future creations including these gorgeous dried heart shaped leaves. Rainbow has also had a lovely time playing with these little fairies that now inhabit the papier mache mushroom that we made last winter.

You may remember our previous inhabitants were little felt fairies. Sadly they and their little 'Coloured Button's' doll's house got wet. The fairies felt hats and dressed ran staining their little faces. The house went soggy and collapsed and Rainbow is very keen for us to make a new one soon.

Microwave Puff Paint

Today's craft builds on some of the craft we've been doing recently - poor man's glitter and squeezy art. The idea comes from One Crafty Momma and is one I've wanted to try for about two years but our absence of a microwave has prevented us. Today we were visiting at my parents' place so it seemed a good opportunity. Though having done it I don't see why it wouldn't work just as well in an oven so we might give that a try another day.

This is a very easy recipe for a little one to make. Indeed making the paint was probably Rainbow's favourite part. It's simply equal parts self-raising flour and poor man's glitter (or salt and a few drops of food colouring). Then mix in enough water to make a thick paste. In these pictures Rainbow is mixing the paint in an old friand tin.

Then create your pictures on cardboard. We used cotton tips.

and squeeze bottles. Rainbow particularly liked to put several colours of paint in the bottle at the same time so that you get multi-coloured splotches.
Then you microwave. We put them in for 10 second sessions until they were cooked. The thickest mountains took 40 seconds. It does get hot so do be careful and also we put a glass of water in simultaneously for safety. These photos don't really show it but they do really puff up.

Here's Moonshines creation.

Before...

And after... and Rainbow's before...

and after (upside down!)...

Body Outlines

Rainbow's art is starting to include bodies for her people. You can see it in her pancake man and also her 'poor man's glitter' person. She's also been experimenting with these elongated head/bodies which are interesting in that I don't believe they are part of the usual progression. This one is a pig - see the snout and curly tailAs yet this isn't coming out in her drawings so I thought we'd have a play around with some body outline art. Here's some things we've had a go at.



Full body artline. We used a large roll of paper that came with the easel. We don't ever use it on the easel but it is great to have on hand for large scale projects. I don't have any photos of these in production as it was a bit of a feat for me. For that reason I probably wouldn't recommend this for the under twos. I had to basically hold Moonshine still with one hand while I traced around her. And when I traced around Rainbow, Moonshine unsupervised got hold of the textas (who knew she could take lids off!) and drew on Rainbow, Rainbow's picture and herself. As you can see this was a surprise for Dadda's birthday. so all's well that ends well. Rainbow enjoyed being traced and seeing her picture but wasn't that fussed on decorating it. In the end we decorated with potato stamps and then Rainbow further decorated hers with watercolours. '

Rainbow's overalls are one of her winter outfits I made. The swirly ruffle that travels down the top and one of the legs is simply the fabric selvage chopped off and sewn on.
I love this photo - Moonshine was so very proud of hers. Have a look at how much of Rainbow's hem is rolled up. I always add a few inches on at the top and bottom of pant patterns when I sew to cover the bulkier cloth nappies and also her long legs. Moonshine on the other hand is of average height.

The speech bubbles are birthday messages for Dadda. He was delighted when he came home to find these 'girls' waiting for him. Rainbow has named hers Laura and says it's her big sister. They've now gone to live at Dadda's work. I was relieved because I kept walking past the inside of this window and getting a fright because I thought someone was looking in.

This is also fun to do with the child lying in different positions.


Toy Outlines
A few days later Rainbow asked me to trace around one of her dolls. This isn't a completely new idea for us as I am regularly asked to trace around bilby and Rainbow's hands on the etch-a-sketch. Here it is from behind so you can see roughly what it looked like.


Rainbow then painted it with watercolours and 'dressed' it with fabric scraps. I'm thinking this time I might give her larger pieces of fabrics and fabric scissors (gasp).

She really enjoyed this project and asked to do this again yesterday. I thought I could keep Moonshine distracted with crayons in her highchair but she really wanted to do what her sister was doing. She really enjoyed this textural collage.

Hand prints We also made a picture like the one below for each of the Grandmas. Once again it wasn't easy tracing around little Moonshine's hand. Rainbows has a drawing on Grandma in it and also finger bones drawn in. Then it's painted with watercolours.

I have removed this and will add it again later as it has the girl's names on it.

There is something about body outlines that never fails to surprise and delight little ones.

Squeezy Edible Art

Rainbow and I are enjoying Masterchef. Rainbow loves watching a little before bed and comes up with her own ideas of what she would cook - such as a steak and cabbage pizza with beer poured on top.

Here's some arty cooking we've been up to using....

a squeezy bottle. We actually have two, Rainbow finds the red bottle easier to squeeze.

Firstly decorating cookies.

The icing is a simple glace icing (icing sugar and hot water) mixed to a thick paste. If it gets too thick the squeezy bottle can be stood in a jug of hot water to make it more viscous.

Here are the finished cookies ready to take to Playgroup. The angel's splotches are pockets. Every angel needs pockets. Also Rainbow put the butterfly aside for herself before handing out the cookies. I wonder why?

I didn't photograph my cookies but I was impressed with how much easier it is to pipe with a squeezy bottle than a piping bag, thought I founds spots a little challenging.

Secondly making pancakes

I often make shaped pancakes but now Rainbow is having a go.

I heat the pan and melt a tiny bit of butter in it. Then take it off the heat for Rainbow to draw her picture. This gives her plenty of time and also this 'slow' cooking gives it a firmer base and makes flipping easier.

A little person.
This pair is by me. Misha and her baby giraffe.
I have been wondering about making a really runny salt dough. Making a picture using the squeezy bottle and then baking but we haven't had time. Anyway art that you can eat is probably much more fun. Do you have a favourite edible art?

Poor Man's Glitter

It's been a month since I last posted. I'm not sure why I've been away so long. Many reasons - I had computer problems, Moonshine and I have been sick and partly just that I've had things sitting heavily on my mind. I'll probably share some of these (I'd actually like your input) but not today.

Instead today here's a really easy craft idea.

I'm sorry I haven't got many photos. So I'll start with the end product and then tell you about it. You use it just like glitter. You apply glue to your paper, sprinkle on the poor man's glitter. Shake the page to spread it around then pour the excess back into the jar. For the abstract design on the left Rainbow used a paint brush to apply the glue. The person was drawn using a glue stick. The following pictures were created using potato stamps stamped in glue. The stamps were made by pressing a cookie cutter into a halved potato. Then with cutter still in place cutting a line parallel to the cut surface. You're then left with a raised shape.

So what is poor man's glitter. Simply salt with a few drops of food colouring added (just a drop or two as you don't want to wet the salt). Mix well so that the colour is dispersed.

Rainbow also likes using the poor man's glitter to make potions. The great thing is because it is salt it dissolves in the water and you get to see the effects of mixing the colours. It really does make the potion magical to a three year old.

Another interesting thing is that if you leave the pictures displayed in the kitchen or bathroom over time the salt absorbs the moisture in the air and changes texture - even dribbling down the picture at times.