Easy Bookmarks

Covered Book Mark
Things You Will Need:

1 roll of clear MacTac - you can pick this up at dollar stores, office supply stores and even some supermarkets
scissors
1 hole punch
markers, crayons, pencil crayons
stickers
ribbon
paper, construction paper or cardstock is best but plain old white paper works fine too.

1. Cut a bookmark sized rectangle from your paper. (about 2.5 inches by 5.5 inches)

2. Colour and decorate with stickers.

3. Peel the sticker paper off the MacTac (just enough to cover both sides of bookmark) and then lay the backside of the decorated paper bookmark down on the the clear MacTac being sure to smooth it out as much as possible.

4.  Fold over so the front side of the decorated bookmarkin laying flat on clear MacTac.  Smooth out all bubbles or creases. 

5.  Trim excess MacTac and punch hole in the top of book mark and add ribbon.

Tada!  A nice little book mark.

Wax Paper Stained Glass Bookmarks

You Will Need:

Wax Paper
Wax Crayons
Pencil Sharper without a catcher for shavings
Paper Towel
Hole Punch
Ribbon
Electric Clothes Iron
Ironing Board
Scissors

1. Place a piece of paper towel on ironing board

2. Place a piece of wax paper

3.  Using pencil sharpener and crayons sprinkle with coloured wax shavings

4. Place another piece of wax paper over the shavings and then place another sheet of paper towel and a piece of newspaper or paper. 

5.  Iron until all the wax has melted and the two sheets of was paper are fused together.

6.  Cut into bookmark shapes and then hole punch and add ribbon.

Indoor Activities For Antsy Kids

Well, here in Vancouver with winter and spring comes rain.  Rain, rain and more rain.  Although I do not hesitate to take my kids for a walk even when its raining, I do tend to avoid walks when the temperatures outside are cold or if its very windy - we have a lot of old trees that occasionally drop large branches on to unsuspecting homes, fences and people when it gets windy.  For the days that we just can't seem to make it outside it is nice to have a few activities to keep the kidlets occupied and content.

One of my daughter's favorites, and also a favorite of the school age children I used to work with is building forts.  You can use almost anything.  Blankets, empty hampers, couches, chairs, indoor tents, pillows, tables - pretty much anything that can act as a roof or hold up a blanket.  Clothespins come in handy too.  I use rubbermaid clothespins they are great for holding rice bags, brown sugar bags, and chip bags closed.  When they are not being used as a food saving device we use them for forts.  Their rubber coating helps keep blankets taut without slipping.  When I was a kid we use heavy books to hold the blankets on surfaces, but if they slipped we suffered a lump on our head or a pointy jab to our legs from falling reading materials.  Clothespins are better.

Another great thing to do inside is bake.  Baking is exciting to children when they get to be involved.  My daughter loves pouring flour and eggs and whatever else the recipes call for into the bowl while the beater whirs around and around.  I have started baking just a few days before the end of the week (Wednesday or Thursday).  I love fresh baking - too much.  So when we bake now I try to package half of it up for our church's coffee time.  That way I am not the one eating all the calories but we still get to bake and have a bit of a treat without storing a bunch of stuff in our freezer.

Another idea we used with our afterschool care program was making our own malleables.  We made kool aid play dough, ooblik, even finger paints.  They use simple pantry ingredients and kids love to make them.

Kool-Aid Playdough

2 1/2 to 3 cups flour
2 cups boiling water with 1 package Kool-aid (any flavor)

3 tablespoons corn oil

1/2 cup salt
1 tablespoon alum
Mix ingredients and knead with flour (may take up to 1 extra cup). Use more if the dough draws moisture in high humidity. Keeps well, has a nice fragrance and is very colorful and very flexible.

Ooblik
Cornstarch and water.  Mix 11/2 cups of cornstarch with 1 cup of water.  Mix together.  It will be hard to mix if you stir it fast.  I read that it is easier to mix with a chopstick.  It is so weird and cool.  When pressure is applied it acts like a solid but as soon as pressure is released it turns into a gooey liquid.   You can also add a drop or two of food colouring if you want it to be a pretty pink, soft blue or minty green.

Finger Paints 

Cornstarch Fingerpaint

Ingredients
3 cups water
1 cup cornstarch
food coloring

Directions
In a medium saucepan, bring water to a boil.  Dissolve cornstarch in a separate bowl with water.   Remove boiling water from heat and add cornstarch mixture.  Return to heat, stirring constantly.  Boil until the mixture is clear and thick (about 1 minute).  Remove from heat.
As the mixture is cooling, divide into separate bowls and add food coloring.  Let the children carefully mix in the coloring.
Hints:

1. Add 1 tbsp of glycerin to make the mixture shiny.  You can find glycerin in most drugstores or pharmacies.  Glycerin can also be used when making homemade snow globes.  It makes liquids more viscus.

Print making is another option.  If you have paints you can use toys cars, large cooking utensils, cut veggies or fruit, toys animals...pretty much anything washable. 

One of my most favorite things as a kid was to get a piece of cardboard.  Big, like the side of a cereal box.  And my mom would squirt on some white corn syrup.  Then she would add a drop of food colouring to each corner of the syrup blob and I would slowly and carefully tilt the cardboard to make the colours mix and ooze.  I don't know why I liked it so much, but I did.  We'd leave it to dry but it never REALLY dries.  It eventually "disappeared" but it was fun while it lasted.

Hide and seek is fun too.  A game I made up when I was working in kindercare called "Hide the Green Gorilla".  We were learning the letter "G" that week so I wanted a game that somehow incorporated "G" words.  I drew a gorilla on green paper and cut it out and then hid it somewhere in the room and allowed the kids to find it.  Whoever found it got to hide it.  They loved it.

I share this story to illustrate that kids just love to play.  Make up games.  Be silly.  Play with play dough.  Finger paint.  Your kids will love it.  They will love just playing with you.