Spooky Halloween Lantern

This post should have been done before Halloween, but I finally got my new camera and couldn't figure out how to get pictures from it to the computer. Better late than never, though, eh?

Here's a quick and easy project for kids. All you need is a mason jar (or any glass jar), tissue paper, white glue, water, a brush, black paper and scissors. First off, mix up the glue with the water to make it runny and less white. Then, brush the mixture onto the jar. Tear off pieces of tissue paper and smooth it over the jar. Once it's wet, it gets a bit fragile, so go carefully.


Then, cut out eyes, a mouth and a nose out of black paper and glue them on. When you've got the jar covered, let it dry a bit and then brush on more mixture to "varnish" it.
Pop in a tea light and ta-da! Jack-o-lantern!


Of course, it helps to have a little munchkin around to supervise.


This is great for Halloween, but how cute would this be in red and green for Christmas?

To Make a Dinosaur Egg

Eva recently did a project on dinosaurs. She presented it in front of the homeschool group (over 60 people!). I thought it'd be fun to make a dinosaur egg to show everyone. Here's how we did it:

First we mixed up a papier maché paste. All it is is flour and enough water to make it the consistency of wallpaper paste (or a thick glue).



Other than that, we used a mold (a balloon the size of a dino egg (I hope?)), and newspaper torn into strips. Also, don't forget an apron. It's messy.



We dipped the newspaper into the paste, removed the excess icky stuff and neatly placed the strips over the balloon until it was entirely covered. Then, we let it dry completely.



When it was dry, we popped the balloon and painted the egg. Actually, that's what we should have done. What we really did was get impatient and pop it too soon. Then we realized that we needed another coat of newspaper because the egg was a bit flimsy. If you try to do that without the mold, it gets the dry parts wet and they cave in and you get a bumpy egg. Oops.


Here's the finished project, bumps and alls!

Our Nativity Scene

I looked all over for a nativity scene the kids and I could craft up. I wanted a simple, free, printable project and I couldn't find one! Then, 2 days before Christmas, I stumbled across one online.

Here it is, a very realistic (?) example of Jesus' humble birth.



Mary, Joseph and little Jesus.



The donkey that carried Mary over all those miles to Bethlehem. Poor donkey. It looks like I feel.



In Maddie's opinion, Mary should have ridden a cow to Bethlehem. According to Mad, cows are much faster because they can run. Hunh.

Banana Cozy

My mom taught me to knit and crochet when I was just a wee lassie. Now, after years of hiatus, I've dusted off my needles and picked it up again.

I'm not a reindeer sweater kind of gal, and I'm not really into knits. I do like fitted tuques, though, but not scarves. So, I've decided to focus on the non-traditional side of knitting. Enter: Banana Cozy!

For those of you who love bananas but are frustrated by the bruises they get from being jostled around in your lunch pail all day - the Banana Cozy is for you! As a bonus, the cozy also keeps your banana nice and warm in the winter. Click herefor the pattern!