sibling handprints

A few weeks ago, while we were waiting for Baby G to arrive, we started this project. I mentioned it in this post.  Two weeks ago G joined us and since then we've finished it. 

I've said before that newborn handprints are pretty elusive. Back when M was a newborn I changed this idea from hands to feet because (at least my) newborns aren't especially cooperative when it comes to painting hands.  We had to get a handprint for this one though because a hand and a foot would have looked a little funny. Therefore, you'll notice G's handprints are a little smudgy. We got the best we could. 

Here they are; small canvases from any craft store, I think they were BOGO when I bought them at Michael's.  A handprint from M and a handprint from G.  They now each have one hanging in their bedrooms.  G's first art project....

Santa ornaments

These ornaments might be one of my favorite crafts we've done so far.  This is kind of a mom-activity since M really didn't have much of a part except for lending his hand for tracing.  However, I bet older kids could try the painting or at least mix the dough.

This is another salt dough activity.  We used salt dough once before.  You basically need one part salt to two parts flour and then about the same amount of water as salt.  For example:
2 cups flour
1 cups salt
1 cup water*
I ad the asterisk because I usually add the water gradually based on the consistency.  For this I only used a 1/2 cup of flour to a 1/4 cup of salt.  We ended up with three ornaments.

The first step is to trace your child's hand and then cut it out.

Mix the ingredients for the salt dough then knead it until it's mixed.  Roll it out flat and use a sharp knife to cut hands using the traced handprint.  I added the holes using a plastic straw:

Let them bake at a low temperature (we baked them at the lowest temperature our oven would go which was around 200 degrees) for one hour.  I flipped ours once so they baked for 30 minutes on each side.

After they come out paint them so that the four fingers are Santa's beard and the thumb is the long part of his hat.  Add a string to hang it:

I wrote M's name and the year on the back of each.  I want to put something on them to preserve them a bit better but I haven't yet.  This is a super cute gift that doesn't cost much to make.  You could even add little tags to the string.  

baby autographed baseball

A quick post about the birthday gift M recently gave to his Papa. Papa is a big sports fan and has a number of autographed baseballs. M loves baseballs and likes seeing Papa's collection so for Papa's birthday M gave him a new ball to add to the collection.

The ball has his handprint on it in ink and his name and the year in ballpoint pen. Tip: do not try to use sharpie on a baseball. The ball came with a plastic case so it made a cute gift (and Papa loved it).

miscellaneous fun

M's daddy was in Chicago this weekend for the Ryder Cup so we tried a few little quick activities over the course of the weekend.  Some were more successful/fun than others but I thought we'd post a bit about each.

Pipe Cleaner Strainer

I'd seen this idea on various blogs and websites I've visited.  You fill the holes of a strainer with pipe cleaners.  It's supposed to be fun to pull them out then try to put them back in.  I say "supposed to be fun" because M found the first part much more entertaining than the second.  He'd never used pipe cleaners before so he had a lot of fun taking them out and inspecting them.  He didn't have as much interest in trying to put them back in.  He found it much more fun to chase the dogs with them.

Sticker Collage

M's had a little experience with stickers in the past but I've never given him a whole sheet of them before.  Nonni brought us some pumpkin stickers so we used them to make a Happy Halloween sign.  At first M was mad when he stuck the stickers to the paper and couldn't get them back off but eventually he got the hang of it.  The trick at the beginning turned out to be providing him with a new sticker as soon as the first was on.  Here's our final product:

Color Sorting

This is my free version of this $30 activity.  M has started to recognize colors, especially when we color with crayons.  I set up three pieces of construction paper (yellow, blue, and red) and we used some of his magnetic letters of the same colors to sort.  M watched me do it then tried it:

To his credit he did do a few on his own.  However, the activity ended shortly after like this:

Card Books

This last one is another mom idea from Pinterest.  If you look for it you'll find a variety of ways to bind together greeting cards into keepsake books.  I am not one to hold on to cards.  I probably have less than 10 saved cards (for me) but I've kept every card M has gotten.  They've been in a box, which seems like a waste, so I took out his first birthday cards and the cards we received right after he was born and made two card books for him.  I found these small 3-ring binders at Staples, which worked great for the cards.  However, if there is such a thing as a small 3-hole punch, I don't have it.  So I ended use a single hole punch to put the cards into the binder.  It was a little more time consuming but it didn't take me more than an hour to make both books - and we had a lot of cards.

Before:

After:

mother's day handprints

On Saturday morning M and I attempted handprint keepsakes for the grandmothers, great-grandmother, and Godmother for Mother's Day.  I found the idea on Imagination Tree.  M is not big on handprints (as seen here) so it took us a few tries.  The best thing about this project was that when our handprints came out sloppy or, more often the case, not deep enough into the dough, we could just roll the dough up and start over.
To make the dough we mixed 1 cup flour, 1 cup salt, and a little less than a 1/2 cup water.  I ended up adding more flour as the first round proved the be too sticky when we pushed M's hand in.  I used a wooden skewer to make holes that I put string through once they were done baking.  We baked them for a little over 2 hours at 200 degrees on parchment paper and I flipped them about halfway through.
After about 24 hours of air drying I painted them with acrylic paint and added an acrylic clear coat on top.  We wrote "Happy Mother's Day 2012" on the back as a finishing touch.