Snowflakes on a winter day

Every christmas time we make paper cutting snowflakes, and whenever possible we make it coincide with a snowfall, last year in the tropics that was obviously not possible. We have had snow for the past three days, yet no accumulation to speak of. This morning the children put on their snow suits and went hunting for ice cycles,  something that always fascinates them...

 Once back inside we made hot chocolate, that is Kaleena made hot chocolate and Keenan made whipped cream while I started the fire

 And then we set about making our snowflakes. Kaleena absolutely loves to make these, from the folding to the cutting and the excitement of unfolding them to find each time a completely unique design.

Throughout winter we will make many of these which we then stick to our windows with sugar water.

(some sugar and a bit of boiling water to dissolve it)

 

 Even Keenan gets involved, although the thickness of the paper is difficult for him to cut through, so he ends up simply cutting into it without cutting out pieces.

~wishing you a wonderful day~

Paper bag Halloween lanterns

Today we made these little lanterns. It was a learn as you go project. We used what we had on hand, therefor we did not use orange tissue paper, rather black, purple and red.

We gave the children each a paper bag to draw a motive on, an outline, which we then cut out

 then we added a bit of glue around the edges of the cut out  (on the inside of the bag) and attached a piece of tissue paper. (For another time, I will be more aware to use the side of the bag that does not have the closing, and also to cover the whole side of the bag, as it shines through and shows exactly where the tissue paper reaches)

Then we gently folded the edges down.

here they are, Kaleena made the one with the cat and one of the bats, and Keenan made the ghost

 The effect is really quite lovely although I still have not quite gotten the hang of capturing the mood of candle light with my camera:)

Needless to say, these are extremely flammable and I was careful to cut all loose tissue paper of, and used great caution when lighting the tea candles inside them.

~May your weekend be filled with the gentle glow of candle light~

Easy to make kite

Having had amazing kite flying conditions these past few days, we decided to make kites today. We have made these before and they are both easy to make and to fly, even if today the winds had decided to take a rest, and the flying was less than usual.

We used construction paper a regular rectangular shape, folded it in half, and to make sure the fold was properly creased, folded it back and forth a couple of times

then laying it in front of you like a book fold at an angle like shown. At the top it is aprox 0.5-1 inch and at the bottom about 2 inches or so, eyeballing is fine.

 then turn it over and open the wings

tape down the middle

 Then for support add a skewer or the like to the widest part at the top with some wide tape.

This time we used some chop sticks we had laying around, but honestly they did not work great. 

Skewers like the ones you might use for kebabs works great, and can easily be broken to size

we ripped some tissue paper strips and attached to the widest part of the bottom flap for a tail

 about one third down from the front of the bottom flap we added a little piece of tape for reenforcement and made a whole through. Through here we tied the string, the other end of the string we taped to a piece of card board and rolled it around to keep until use

Like I said the wind was taking a rest today, so the kite did not fly as high as other days:(

 but it did fly

 Zoe the baby cow was extremely curious about the kite, and ended up eating one of our tails

Kaleena really got it flying

and afterwards the children enjoyed the beautiful day and the peace of the country side, picking little flowers and making tiny wreaths, and exploring the newly cut meadows

~a good night to you~