Fun 4th of July Activity

This fun craft is great idea for the Fourth of July. We had great fun making them!

This is what you'll need:

• Mini Craft Sticks
• Foam or Felt Squares
• Foam or Felt Circles
• Glue
• Wiggle Eyes
• Paint - Red
• Paint - White
• Paint - Blue
• Paint Brush
• Magnets

1. Use paint to color craft sticks using the photo as a reference.
2. Glue five craft sticks together to create a flag shape. For Uncle Sam, use 2 wood squares for hat and face.
3. Cut a small circle from foam sheet for face.
4. Glue on wiggle eyes.
5. Once paint and glue has dried, attach a piece of magnet to the back.

Happy Fourth of July!!!

Fun Tissue Paper Valentine Vase

Looking for a fun gift idea for kids to make? This Valentine’s Day vase is great idea. Kids will have tons of fun adding their own personal touch to their vase.

What you will need:

• Mod Podge® Sparkle
• Tissue Paper - Various Colors
• Scissors
• Paint Brush

Instructions:

1. Cut or tear tissue paper in small random shapes.


2. Paint thin coat of Mod Podge onto outside of vase in a 6” square area.


3. Place small pieces of random colors of tissue paper into wet Mod Podge letting them overlap slightly. Brush on Mod Podge over top of applied tissue. Brush more Mod Podge adjacent to the area just completed and continue to place tissue into the wet Mod Podge. Continue this process until vase is covered with tissue.


4. Cut heart shapes from silver paper. Use Mod Podge to attach to project where desired.


5. Use liner brush to apply Mod Podge around hearts and write “LOVE”.


6. Let dry completely.

Make Back To School Fun - Idea #3

Create the Coolest Bookcover Ever

Transform an ordinary school binder into an extraordinary one!

Get your child their own designer book cover for school, by choosing this tie-dye fabric book cover or pick out a patterned cloth of your kid's choice to suit their own individual tastes.

What you'll need:

• Large brown paper grocery bag or brown craft paper
• Fabric scraps
• White craft glue
• Small bowl
• Water
• Paintbrush
• Wax paper
• Scissors
• Textbook

How to make it:

1. First you will need to make the shell of the book cover. Afterward, you will remove the book cover and decoupage it. Begin by cutting the brown paper bag open: Using scissors, cut from the top of the bag to the bottom at one of the corner creases.
2. Cut the bottom off the bag completely. You should have a long rectangle when finished.
3. Lay your text book in the center of the rectangle.
4. Fold the top and bottom of the rectangle up so that the height of the rectangle is equal to the height of the text book. Crease the folds by pressing with your fingers.
5. Bring the left side of the paper cover over the book and line up the ends with the right side of the paper cover.
6. Open the book and fold the left side of the paper around the cover of the book.
7. Repeat this on the other side of the book as well.
8. Open the cover of the book. You need to trim the paper to about half the width of the actual book’s cover. Use a pencil to mark the paper inside the cover where you will trim it.
9. Repeat this on the other side of the book as well. Remove the cover from the book and trim off the excess paper with scissors.
10. Carefully slide the front and back cover of the text book into the temporary paper cover to make sure it fits. Adjust the height accordingly if the cover feels too snug or too loose. When you are happy, remove the cover and set the textbook aside.
11. Line work surface with wax paper.
12. Mix together 2/3 glue and 1/3 water in a bowl with your paintbrush. Use a soup or cereal sized bowl filled about halfway. Make more if you run low.
13. Cut fabric into pieces, any size is fine. Approximately 2” x 2” is a nice workable size.
14. Open paper book cover and place the "good" side face up onto the wax paper.
15. Begin by painting a 2” section in a top corner of the paper with the glue mixture. Place a piece of fabric on to the glue mixture. Add more glue mixture to your paintbrush and paint over the top of the fabric scrap, smoothing with your paintbrush as you go. Scrap should be saturated and plat but not dripping. Repeat this process, covering the paper completely, overlapping fabric pieces as you go.
16. When paper is covered with fabric, open the book cover up and carefully place the textbook back inside it as you did before you applied the fabric.
17. Carefully close the book; place a piece of wax paper in between the front cover and the front page and the back cover and the back page. This will keep the wet decoupage cover from sticking to the actual textbook as it dries.
18. Allow to dry overnight then remove the wax paper from the book.
    

Tips:

• Recycle old fabric by saving the scraps in a zipper plastic bag or plastic container to use for a future project.
• Personalize this project by cutting letters out of a contrasting fabric color and decoupage child’s name on front of cover.
• If any of the fabric scraps are sticking up after drying, use white glue to stick them down.

Make Back To School Fun - Idea #2

Personalize Your Own Lunch Bag

Be enviro-friendly and trendy when you bring your lunch to school!

Do your part to keep trash out of landfills by making your child their very own personalized lunch bag that they can use over and over again. When school is out, use this cute bag to carry toys, snacks, or coloring supplies.

What you'll need:

• Small canvas bag (11"x9"x3")
• Foam stamps (smiley face, bugs and letters for name)
• Fabric paint (yellow, green, pink, purple, orange, light blue, black)
• 3-D fabric paint
• Paintbrushes (thin and medium)
• Fabric hook-and-loop fasteners (recommended: Velcro)
• Sewing needle
• Thread to match canvas bag
• Wax paper

How to make it:

1. Line inside of canvas bag with wax paper.
2. Line up alphabet foam stamps on top of bag to decide where you want the child’s name to be. Once you are happy with the placement, paint the foam letter stamps purple, one at a time, and carefully press down on to the canvas bag. Lift stamp straight up to remove. Repeat for entire name.
3. Paint a smiley face stamp with yellow paint. Apply to the bottom right corner of the bag in the same manner as described in step 1.
4. Paint bug stamps with different colors (pink and purple for a butterfly, yellow and purple for ladybug, and so on) and decorate the rest of the bag.
5. Use a paintbrush to touch up any areas that the stamps may have missed.
6. Use paintbrush to add any details to bugs, such as dots on backs, antennas, or decorations on wings.
7. When paint has dried, use 3-D fabric paint tubes to pipe a border around the smiley face and the child’s name.
8. Place bag in a safe place to dry overnight.
9. Sew fabric hook-and-loop fasteners to the inside lip of the bag to keep it closed.
   

Tips:

• You can easily adapt this project for a boy by using primary colors, bugs, cars, or sport stamps.
• If you don’t have fabric paint, you can use acrylic craft paint mixed with textile medium.
• You can fix textile medium at your local craft store, simply follow the mixing instructions on the bottle.
• You can wash your lunch bag on gentle in the washing machine, lay flat to dry.

Make Back To School Fun - Idea #1

Decorate Your Own Desk Supply Box

Keep your school supplies organized and looking cool with this school box craft!

Make this adorable supply box to hold all your supplies and have a handy organizer while you are using them! Cubbies on top hold glue, erasers, pencil sharpeners, crayons, and whatever you are using at the time.

What you'll need:

• Child size shoe box
• 3 sheets yellow construction paper
• 2 sheet green construction paper
• Acrylic paint (blue, red, green, brown, orange, yellow, black)
• 3” square box with lid
• Plastic water bottle (12-16 oz)
• School-themed foam stamps (school bus, apple, star, crayons)
• 1” x 7” strip of orange felt
• Paintbrush
• White craft glue
• Glue stick
• Clear tape
• Scissors
• Black marker

How to make it:

1. Check corners of shoe box and use tape to close any gaps, rips, or tears.
2. Cover shoe box with yellow construction paper using a glue stick to attach to sides, and tape to close at ends and corners.
3. Cover lid with green construction paper using glue stick and tape as in step 2.
4. Paint the sides and inside of small box blue and the lid red. Set aside to dry.
5. Cut bottom off of plastic bottle about 3” up.
6. Glue orange felt strip around the top of the opening of the plastic bottle. Felt should overlap on inside and outside of bottle opening to cover cut edges.
7. Cut a piece of green construction paper in a circle to fit the bottom of the bottle and glue in place. Set aside to dry.
8. Decorate the outside of the box with school-themed stamps. Paint each foam stamp and press firmly on to the construction paper. Lift directly up to remove. Let dry.
9. Use white craft glue to attach the red lid, blue box and bottle bottom to the lid of your school supply box. Allow to dry completely.
10. Use black marker to add a simple math equation to the side of the box.
11. Use black marker to write “school” on the side of the bus.
12. When everything is dry, fill box with supplies. When you are using the supplies, fill the bottle with crayons, lids with glue, scissors, eraser, and pencil sharpener--whatever you need to have on hand.

Tips:

• Use clear tape to secure any edges that won’t stick down with glue.
• Careful not to overload the top of your box by piling too many items inside.
• If any of your organizers come loose, simply secure with glue.

Birthday Parties for Creative Kids

Looking for a fun place to have a birthday party?

Consider a craft party at Michaels!

You can select a party theme and project tailored to your child’s special interests. When the party is over, each guest will have a fun take-home souvenir.

Theme Ideas:
sports, animals, flowers, butterflies, car/trucks, bugs, action heroes, fairies and much more!

Project Ideas:
doorknob signs, bulletin boards, pennants, storage boxes, aprons, t-shirts, tote bags and decorating brownies, cookies or cupcakes

Or if you'd rather party at home, Michaels will put together your customized project — complete with all the materials and instructions for your birthday guests to make at your house.

For more information, visit The Knack.

It’s Party Time!

Fun Butterfly Craft

We have been planning fun crafts for Ashley's Birthday party and found a great butterfly craft that is easy to do!

You will need:

~ Scissors
~ Ruler
~ Scrapbook paper
~ Pipe cleaners

Instructions:

1. For each butterfly, cut two 2 1/2-inch squares from scrapbook paper. Trim the left and right sides of the squares to round them, as shown.

2. Accordion-fold each of the squares to create two sets of wings.

3. For the butterfly's body, cut a pipe cleaner in half. Fold one of the halves into a V-shape, as shown, and twist the ends together a few times just above the bend to create an abdomen (it should be about an inch long).

4. Sandwich both sets of wings between the pipe cleaner ends above the abdomen, and twist the ends a couple more times to hold them snugly in place.

5. Use your fingers to pull the wings open a bit, and then curl the tips of the pipe cleaner to shape antennae.

Flower Fairies

I would like to share a fun craft for kids that may very likely bring hours of entertainment if you are looking for something to do…

As I work away at my dining room table, making flower clips and other flower-related crafts, the table is covered with a variety of flowers ~ in every color, shape and size. The assortment is quite tempting to Ashley. She entertains herself quite nicely as she picks out just the right combinations for little flower fairies that she leaves all over the house.

I finally decided to help her permanently assemble the "flower combinations" that she was enjoying so much. I hope your children (or friends) get as much enjoyment from your flower fairies as Ashley has from hers.

You will need:

- Wood Bead

- Flesh colored pipe cleaner or chenille stick

- Sparkly leaves (Gold, silver or white) or white craft foam

- Craft Glue

Start by taking your flower and removing it from the stem, if your stem has leaves you can use these to form a hat or use the stem of the flower as we have.

If your bead does not have a face on it, then use permanent markers to place some dots for eyes and a little dot nose. Ashley likes to include a smile too.

Cut the chenille stick in half.

Take one half to form the legs by creating a V shape with a slight bend at the end for the feet. Take the bent end and glue it into the top and center of the flower using craft glue.

Take the other half of the chenille stick and bend it into another V shape. Bend in some hands and some elbows. Glue the bent end this piece into the bottom of the bead to form the neck and arms.

Now glue the top body piece (Head and Arm piece) onto the bottom of the flower as shown in the picture. A dd the stem to form a hat (or use leaves or other smaller flowers as we have).

Use two sparkly leaves to form wings and glue them to the back. Or you can use craft foam, packing foam or even felt. You can be pretty creative with material you use for the wings.

These fairies make great little get well gifts or friendship gifts. Ashley loves to play with hers and has a hard time parting with any of them.

To see a few more of our flower fairies, visit our online store at http://www.acornaccessories.com/.