Craftin

I have found a newfound love of the Waldorf swaps. Basically in a nutshell a bunch of moms pick a theme, do some major crafting and then swap and share! This months theme was "Play Kitchen" so I was very excited seeing I just finished making the kids their own bigger kitchen out of a repurposed coffee table. I hope it isn't just me but I get frustrated when I look at some of the toy kitchens and it seems only 1-2 children can fit over there at a time. With 7 total its just not an option so the coffee table was a much better fit.

 My contribution for the swap is sushi so I journaled a bit for inspiration.  

and then Beanie and Koda helped paint all the pieces I had cut out from my new scroll saw I received from my dad for my birthday.

Aren't they sweet?!

Read Build Write

Well I LOVE  the read,build, write boards that Homeschool Creations made. We have started working on cursive with Mark however getting him to practice writing needs a little more creativity. I have made my own cards to go along with her boards found here Read Build Write boards .


Homeschool Creations has made several sets of cards to go along with general themes and some that go with books. These were great for starting out for us and I plan on using them for holidays. My favorite set I think has to be the ones for Star Wars.


All of the cards I have made are black and white as I do not buy color ink normally. We laminate them and they are pretty durable.

I will add more as I make them.

Pixar Cars - download
Spiderman- download
Toy Story - Download

DIY texture letters

Well I have wanted to get Nanners some sandpaper letters for awhile now. However being frugal (read: super poor) I decided to make some so she can use. I did not have sandpaper and I did not want to buy ANYTHING. I had seen some Chinese letters done in glitter glue before so I figured I could take the idea and morph it into my own.

 

 Our finished product. 

First I traced out our template.We used manilla folders cut into 8ths (4 from each side of the folder). I did not feel like buying cardstock. 

I got my outline for cursive letters from here. Find Cursive letter template I figured I would try cursive with her first as more and more I see children have an easier time with cursive than print. I did not bother printing these templates. I placed the manilla folder DIRECTLY on my laptop with the screen laying flat so I could trace it.

 

Then we colored everything in. Blue for the consonants and red for the vowels.  It matches the set of movable letters I have downloaded for when she is ready. (We have noncolor coded letters for her older brother to practice his reading/writing)

 

Then I took my hot glue gun and filled in all the letters. They are stringy and blobby which gives it a weird texture. You have to go over them slowly which makes more emphasis on the letter. 

And that's it! Simple as that! The other kids got to help me do all of the coloring and ironically our 9 year old, Beanie colored better than my 14 year old, Kota. Go figure. 

 

Plus a picture of Nanners and Beanie working together on our snaps electric board. We got it for free at the homeschool conference in Chicago and it gets used often. Nanners loves watching the older kids make fans and making things go flying! 

I am linking up to Montessori Monday!