Popsicle Craft -- Father's Day

The kids made Father's Day cards today and I wanted it to include a little craft. So first they used watercolors and painted the middle of a paper plate. (You don't have to use a plate, but I wanted something thicker than regular paper and the plates worked very well.)

I think if I was still in my classroom with older kids (4 and 5 years), I would've had them pick three colors and paint stripes. But for these young kiddos, I just let them paint it however they wanted. When it was dry, I cut a popsicle shape out of it and taped a craft stick to the back. Now, they are pretty cute all on their own,

but I glued them to the front of a card and wrote, "You are one cool Pop!"

On the inside I wrote "Happy Father's Day" and the kids decorated it.

My daughter made a second one for her grandpa. She calls him Pop Pop and his birthday is in a couple weeks, so we made it as a birthday card.

They turned out so cute and were very simple to make!

Citrus Art Ideas

This week I'm spending my days with my 2-year-old daughter and an almost-3-year-old girl who was in my daughter's class. I've kind of had to shift gears when it comes to art projects, since I'm used to crafting with 4- and 5-year-olds. Because summer is right around the corner, I thought some citrus art would be fun! I used masking tape to make my lines on a small paper plate. I cut one piece of tape into three strips so they'd be thinner. I put one piece straight down the middle and then made the other two into an X.

I cut the plate across the middle, but you could also put tape across the middle and leave the plate whole. We used neon paint that I found at Michaels a couple years ago.

And the sponge brushes were given to me by a nurse when I was in the hospital for my daughter's birth. She found out I was a preschool teacher and asked me if I wanted them. Of course!

But I forgot about them until I cleaned out a closet not too long ago. They ended up being perfect for this project. I poured some paint onto another paper plate and the girls dabbed the paint on their plates.

They made one in each color, representing a lime, orange and lemon. When they were dry I peeled off the tape. Then I decided to paint the rim using regular tempera paint. I love how they turned out!

We also had some citrus fun by painting with jello! I mixed cold water into jello powder until it was a thick paint.

It smelled so good! The girls painted with the jello onto cardstock,

and as in the case of my daughter, on her hand!

It was very sticky, but the girls had fun. It dried with an interesting texture, too!

There's one more citrus idea I want to share with you, if this post isn't too long already. Back in February, my class made citrus prints for our Five Senses theme, but I never got around to blogging about it.

I cut up lemons, limes and oranges the night before we did this so they would be dried out. I originally planned on using paint with them, but it didn't work so well. Then I tried an ink pad and it was much better!

The neon ones are paint, the blue and purple are ink. So I cleaned off the fruit slices and put them all on ink pads, using all the colors just for fun. And the kids stamped away.

The notches in the top of the fruit gave the kids something to hold on to.

The prints were very detailed. I thought they looked so cool!

I should warn you, though, that they kind of ruined the ink pads. (Sorry, boss.) I think it was because I had to wash the paint off my fruit so they were damp. If your fruit is really dried out, I think it would be fine.
Hope you enjoyed these citrus ideas!

Gettin' Antsy!

I put up my end-of-school-year display today. I had each of the kids make an ant. I originally cut out a bunch of circles from different colored paper. The kids glued 3 circles together, added legs, antennae and eyes. As they were coming together I thought they looked more like caterpillars.

And then my boss walked in and said, "Ooh! Caterpillars!" So I ended up scratching that idea and coming up with a new one rather quickly. I cut "lemon" shapes and circles out of black construction paper. The kids glued two lemon-shapes together and one circle for the head of the ant. I randomly cut a bunch of small rectangles for legs, without worrying too much about making them all the same. The kids glued six legs on their ant.

I also cut out some longer rectangles for the antennae. We used neon wiggle eyes to add some color to our ants. The kids drew on a smile with a metallic Sharpie.

I hung them in the hall with the title, Gettin' Antsy For Summer. Under each child's ant, I wrote their favorite thing to do in summer.

Check this one out. Her response was to "squish ants" and she actually drew the mouth of her ant wide open, instead of a smile. So I couldn't resist having a little fun with that and I made a thought bubble above the ant's head that said, "Yikes!"

LOVE IT!

And in case you are wondering, I let the kids take home their "caterpillars" after they drew in some eyes. (I had torn off the wiggle eyes so we could use them on the black ants.) I'm so glad I changed the craft a bit because I love how they turned out! And now I am going to carefully clean my camera lens because I think I see a smudge...

Fun Fact: Ants have two stomachs -- one for themselves and one to feed others.

Seasonal Trees

We discussed the four seasons this week and did a little project every day to go along with each season.

We used large white construction paper and I divided it into four sections. In the top left box, I wrote "Fall" in dotted lines so the kids could trace it.

Then they drew a tree and used Q-tips dipped in paint to add colorful leaves.

The next day they made a winter tree by gluing on cotton balls to the branches and on the ground for snow.

When we discussed spring, they again drew a tree and added scrunched up pink tissue squares dipped in glue to the branches to make flower buds.

And finally they made a summer tree by using corks dipped in green paint.

I love how they turned out. I was originally thinking of using a template to make the trees and just have the kids color them in. But by having them each draw their own trees made the project more personalized and special.

One boy made really small trees and they reminded me of Charlie Brown's Christmas tree. So cute!

Footprint Flip-Flops

It's the last week of summer vacation around here, and a hot one to boot. Our theme this week is the beach, so it fits perfectly. Earlier this summer, one of my daughter's teachers made these flip-flops with the babies:

So cute, right? I knew I had to make them with my class. First I mixed brown and white paint to make a skin-tone color and I painted the kids' feet and made prints. I cut them out and they glued them to a flip-flop shape I made from construction paper. (You could also just cut around your footprint in a flip-flop shape like above.)

Then the kids added the straps. To make the straps, I folded several pieces of neon paper in half and cut the corners off, then cut again making about a half-inch wide strip.

This made the ends of the strips pointy so it could fit between the toes. I helped the kids position them on their footprints.

(Don't worry about the extra part. That gets trimmed later.) If the kids wanted to, they could paint their toenails!

Finally, they added a flower to the strap.

The flowers were cut using my Cricut, which are actually for an upcoming project, but I knew I could spare a few to give these flip-flops the final touch. After trimming the straps, here are the adorable flip-flops:

Ooh, I love them!