Picture in "Stained Glass" sans the glass..

So, most of the supplies you need for this project you probably already have at home.  You will need:  Saran Wrap, Aluminum Foil, a sheet of cardstock (or three if you want to "frame" the masterpiece), tape, markers, and a Black Sharpie (probably brand name, as the ink seems to show up better), and something to trace if you want to.  Off we go......

First you need a sheet of saran wrap a bit bigger than your cardstock, 

and if your child wants something traced, have them pick the picture out now....

My son decided he wanted to do Batman.....

Gently stretch the saran wrap over the picture you're going to trace, and start taping the corners

and maybe a couple of the edges to the table or whatever surface you're working on...

try to have it end up as smooth as possible without wrinkles as it will 

make your life much easier with the tracing.....

With a black Sharpie (a skinnier one would work way better) that is not

dried out, i.e. the ink comes out really dark, trace over the outline of the picture underneath...

or draw whatever picture your heart desires but just the outline....

(this was not dark enough...I had to go dig another one out that was much darker.....)

Let the little one have at it with their markers to color it in.....you can either leave the original picture underneath, or slide it out and put a piece of white paper underneath.....

cause then it doesn't lead to as many "wayward" lines if you have plain paper underneath....oh well, it adds character, right?

Gently slide the book/paper out from underneath the saran wrap

take a piece of foil a bit bigger than your cardstock, and gently crumple.....but not too much, because....

you need to "uncrumple" it gently and stretch it a bit, but you want to keep all of the texture....

Turn the shiny side of the foil down, and place one piece of cardstock in the middle, and gently fold all the edges of the foil over the cardstock.....

turn it over and it should more or less look like this.....

Gently unstick the taped edges of your saran wrap, this might be a good time for an extra set of hands....

Line up the picture how you want it over the foil wrapped cardstock.... and flip it over and tape an edge to the cardstock and gently stretch the saran wrap as you tape to the back, flipping from back to front as you go to make sure you don't have any major wrinkles on the front.

Now, if you want to stop here, you're more than welcome to be finished....or you can add a bit of frame for your childs masterpiece.....

Take two pieces of cardstock in the same color and measure/spread out behind/against your finished artwork and where they overlap put tape where you won't see it.  You can glue the edge where it will be visible....

Then Glue ( you can just use regular glue, or whatever you have, I just had my glue gun out for something else) the artwork to the "frame"....

Here's the finished Stained Glass....

He, of course, had to find the "perfect" place for it, on his Batman wall....

I think he nailed it.

So, that's it for this one, I hope you can enjoy this with whatever munchkins you have in your life, and let your imagination soar with it......  If you'd like after you're done, come back and leave me a link so I can come see a pic of the masterpieces you've done with the little ones in your life.  Thanks for hanging out with me for a bit, I hope you enjoy this with your kids as much as I did with one of mine!

Tissue Paper Rainbow Catcher

So, today I'm sharing something that my 2 year old especially likes, but it's also something my 8 year old enjoys as well.....You need different colors of tissue paper, scissors, clear contact paper (we found some in the aisle with the shelf liner paper at walmart), and some construction paper (if you want to cut out shapes to add in with the tissue paper)....

Before the fun begins, you need to roll out a square/rectangle of contact paper, cut it off the roll, and peel the paper off.  I usually try to just peel one end of the paper off at a time so I can tape the corners to the table the kids are working at, just make sure the contact paper is sticky side up.  You can either cut out squares (really it doesn't matter if they are all uniform, or really square) before or after you get the contact paper fixed to the table.  (This would also be a good time to do construction paper shapes if you decide you want to do them)

Then the kids can put the shapes and tissue squares wherever they want on the contact paper.  Just try to help them not put a pile of them in one spot, just spread them out.

 

Like that pile up there to the right of Rue's hand....don't worry we fixed it.

 

I just love watching those tiny fingers work their magic....and how every piece has a specific spot.

This part can be a bit tricky, but I've found that if you (once again) only unroll one end at a time it goes a bit better.  This time you want the sticky side of the contact paper down, so the layers sort of stick together.  Oh, I usually try to cut the top piece a bit bigger than the bottom piece underneath so it will overlap, and then it doesn't matter so much if you get all the edges lined up and perfectly matched.....trust me mine aren't....

 

As you continue peeling the paper from underneath, gently press on the contact paper so you don't end up with bubbles and lines in your finished project.Then you can either fold over the sticky edges to encase the masterpiece, or you can use your scissors to trim the raw edges off.

Rue decided that she wanted to hang her masterpiece in her big brothers window, because he did something to his blinds a few months ago and they ended up on the ground and they can't be fixed.  So, long story short, he's not had any sort of "window treatment" for a bit now.  So, we got the tape out and decided where it would go, and also that we were going to make another to go beside this one so the bottom part of his window would be completely covered with her art.  (I should've just rolled out a longer piece for her to work on, but you know how hindsight is 20/20, right?)  Sorry for the funky quality of the pic, way too much snow outside, and his light bulb had burnt out..... but you get the gist....

I wanted to show you what I did with the munchkins last summer.  I had rolled out a long piece and had the kids go to town, and we also used construction paper shapes (the hearts and flowers and stars, which you just put in between the layers of contact paper, when you do the tissue paper stuff) which aren't as transparent.  Really, for the older kids you could do a whole "scene" or picture this way.  

I didn't have anything covering the window in our backdoor that's in the kitchen, which was sort of creeping me out, and I didn't want to hang a curtain because I was afraid it would stick out too far as our steps downstairs are perpendicular to the door.  I tried that mylar sticky reflective stuff, which you're not supposed to be able so see through, but you can, and it's a pain in the butt to try to adhere or cut or mess with.  Long story short, I cut up their tissue paper design and taped (shh, we won't tell) the pieces onto the glass panels in the door.  It worked great, and I get that nice color which is so awesome about this time of year, with all the gray and snow and such.  Again with the funky pic, but really the colors haven't faded as much as I thought, because we get full sun on that side of the house, and it's been up there for at least 6 months.

So, do you have any neat artsy craftsy ideas to share?  Please do.....

Kaleidoscope colors in the midst of the Snow

I've been meaning to share some fun things to do with the munchkins in your life for a while now, but just now remembered to take some pics to go along with the words.  Here's how to make beautiful tissue paper flowers that your munchkins will have tons of fun doing.

These are great for kids around age 5, prolly depending on the child.....my 5 year old son had a bit of difficulty with the stem wrapping part, but loved picking out the colors for his flower.

So, the supplies are relatively simple, you need tissue paper in many colors, and some pipe cleaners in green shades (or at least this is what my oldest insists on, really you can go as colorful as you'd like.) and some imagination.

Next, unfold the tissue paper and lay all the pieces on top of one another, and then cut strips about 4-5 inches wide (across the width, not the longest side.) and then cut those strips into 3 pieces.

Pick out at least 4 "squares" of different colors, but you can do as many as 10 or so.  Then lay all the "squares" on top of each other.

Next fold the stack like an accordion....

 

Then, take your pipe cleaner and fold the top 1-2 inches over the fold you just made in the tissue paper stack, and then twist the pipe cleaner together so it's now "holding" the tissue paper.... 

 

So, the pic up there is not behaving and going to the center....but oh well....Next you gently pull the innermost layer of tissue paper upwards out of the "accordion"and do that again on the other side.....then keep alternating sides until there's no more layers left.

 

That's it you're done, although my oldest insists that you must have a ribbon to tie you bouquet together with...

 

In the next few days, I'll post on how to make an awesome colorful display for your window....or rather something your munchkins will love to do that will brighten up the gray dreary drab feeling of winter....