4th of July Tee

You will need:

• A red, white or blue t-shirt
• Red, white and blue fabric paint
• Different size sponges, cut into star shapes
• Cardboard, wrapped in plastic bag

How to:

1. Insert plastic wrapped cardboard into shirt. (This will prevent the fabric paint from seeping through the shirt.)
2. Dip sponges into fabric paint and "stamp" on to t-shirt.

3. Let dry.

Thoughts:

Easy, peasy! And really cute.

Elliott's Evaluation:

I liked everything! I liked dabbing the stars on. That's my comment.

Kitchen Fireworks



Turn everyday kitchen items into a dazzling display!

You will need:

• Liquid dish soap
• Milk
• Food coloring
• Small saucer
• Q-tips

How to:

1. Pour milk into saucer.
2. Pour one drop of each food color into milk. Don't stir!
3. Place one drop of dish soap on to the end of a Q-tip. Place Q-tip into milk and watch the show!

Thoughts:

I'm back to being a full-time working mom and finding time for crafts has been hard. I found this science project online and thought it would be a great way to kill a few minutes between dinner and bedtime. What fun! Elliott was totally enraptured by this experiment and I have to admit I was too.

Telling a 4 year old NOT to stir up four shades of food color is like telling me to NOT check out a book at the library: it doesn't happen. Once stirred, the colors turn very dark and it's harder to see the results. Elliott didn't care! He loved every second of this. We did it a couple of times and you will too, so keep extra supplies handy.

Elliott's Evaluation:

It is very cool and funny. Wow! It's so funny! It was so pretty. Super pretty. What will happen when we put one more drop of color in? Oooh, that's super pretty. Let's stir it up. Ooh! That's pretty, too! Can we do this again tomorrow? Whoa!! Look at how dark it is when all the colors are mixed up. I love this so much!

Fireworks Hat



Homemade hats for the 4th of July

You will need:

• Red, white and blue rolls of duct tape
• Flexible straws (about 35 per hat)
• Pipe cleaners (red, white and blue)
• Star garland, cut into 6 inch lengths (We found ours at the Dollar store)
• Tape measure

How to:

1. Measure the circumference of child's head. Cut a piece of blue duct tape to this length plus 2 inches. Lay tape sticky side up. Place straws on tape, placing so that flexible part of straw is at top edge of tape. Make sure to leave four inches of blank tape on each end.




Lining up the second piece of tape. (A bit too hard for youngsters to do on their own)


2. Cut a second piece of blue tape, the same length as the first, and place it sticky side down to form a "sandwich" for the straws. Try to make sure there are no exposed bits of tape. (It's tough on hair!)




Layer pieces for tri-color headband.


3. Cut a piece of red duct tape the same length as blue and fold it over the bottom edge of the blue piece. Repeat with white duct tape to create a tri-colored headband.
4. Fit headband to child's head and tape together to form a circle. (Be sure not to make it too tight! It should easily fit over child's head, but not be so loose that it falls in their eyes.)




Fancy pieces lure the boys back over.


5. Slide curled pipe cleaners and garland into the straws. Fan out straws if desired.
6. Wow your neighbors with your fancy new hat!

Thoughts:

OK, can I say how flippin' cool this hat looks? I wanted one for myself! Lining up the tape was an adult's job, which was good because neither Elliott or Jack had any desire to help us out. In fact, they both abandoned us to go play with toys after a couple of minutes.



And we've lost them.

The crazy garland and curly pipe cleaners lured them back and they both enjoyed putting the pieces into the straws.

The finished products were so cute! However, an exposed piece of tape pulled Jack's hair. That, and the fact that his was just a tad too tight made him leery of putting it back on. Elliott decided monkey see, monkey do and even though his fit fine, announced his was too tight as well. I was able to get him to wear it to a couple of 4th of July picnics later in the week.


Elliott's Evaluation:
I remember making them. But, Jack didn't like it. His hat was too tight. Mine was a little tight, too.

Indoor Fireworks

A very easy project to celebrate patriotic holidays.

You will need:

• Pipe cleaners (any colors will do)
• Glue
• Glitter
• Thread

How to:

1. Dip the ends of pipe cleaners into glue and then into glitter.
2. Twist one pipe cleaner around the middle of the others to cinch them together.
3. Fan out to make "fireworks".
4. Loop thread around one end and hang.
5. Repeat the phrases "Oooh" and "Ahhh" over and over.

Thoughts:
A pretty quick craft. I think it took longer to try to sort out red, white and blue pipe cleaners than to actually complete the project. Elliott enjoyed dipping the ends into glitter. (Helloooo! It's glitter.) But he lost interest in shaping them. Still: easy, cheap and done in a jiff. Not to mention El loved seeing them hanging around the house.