…my six year old daughters latest art work, make of it what you will. (I home school so I’m kind of cheating and claiming their creations as they are in my space and I was the creative force behind the exercise) At first I was leaning towards a What happens in the craft room stays in the craft room approach to her art work but my curiosity got the better of me. Apparently its a ball and a sign post but the sign part fell off, why…what did you think it was???

As well as the um…free form art work we wrote our names in cuneiform

Made Sumerian seals, used in ancient Mesopotamia for leaving your mark when you made a bargain, you know putting your seal on it.

we made recycled paper (closest thing I could think of to papyrus) and wrote our names in Hieroglyphs

This is my own personal never ending project. I Had this brilliant idea that I would crotchet a baby blanket for Sabrina when she was born, she’s now two and I’m only just starting to join them together. I think I’ll have to add more squares and make it bed sized.

and this is the toy I still haven’t finished and should have sent off weeks ago for a swap. maybe now that the birthday month is over I’ll get things done. Maybe if I keep coming back to this meme I’ll feel guilted into actually getting something done. Maybe.

check out more Creative Spaces here

To help your little one make this cute little table centre piece you will need:

a foam cone

paint

green paper

sticky tape

glue stick

and a packet of decofoam pins

My kids weren’t happy with just one shade of green but I didn’t want the paintwork to be to busy and distract from the decorations. As a compromise I broke the green into three lightening it with a little white to give them three shades to play with.

Stick a small square of green paper onto a plate with sticky tape.

Then glue the foam cone onto the paper with glue stick. Clear tacky craft glue eats away at the foam so be careful.

Now that the tree is glued in place the kids can paint it with minimal touching. Yes mine did keep putting their fingers on the top but they could turn the tree around by twisting the plate and were generally fairly paint free by the end of the activity.

Sorry for the wonky photo, just had to show you how excited they all were to paint a cone green.

I emptied the packet of Decofoam Pins into a small plastic container. That way the kids could easily pick them up and I could store any left overs simply by putting the lid on.

Once the trees are dry put the pins on the table and let the kids go for it.

Cut the tree off the paper this leaves a nice green base to seal the bottom.

Alanah was quite taken by her tree. She decided to make a pattern with the pins and when she had finished she said it looked like a dalek.

EXTERMINATE EXTERMINATE HO HO HO.

This little guy is for our friends first ever little baby, I’m very excited. Glenn and I went to Uni with the Daddy (sorry didn’t check whether they minded their names being plastered all over the internet) so we have known them for a while and have been patiently wondering when they were going to produce a play mate for our horde.

I think he looks a little like an Eliphoctopus with legs like that. I like saying Eliphoctopuss because it makes Glenn think I’m saying a bad word and then he giggles, I’m probably going to get in trouble for writing that.

Their nursery seamed to be mostly red cream and green so the little elephant is wearing colours to match.  His ears are made out of crocheted circles. I’ve only ever made granny squares before look at me branching out. The eye are hand embroidery, in fact every stitch in him is done by hand as I still don’t have a sewing machine (do you sense the frustration??)

I know, enough of the elephant already but this was Glenn’s favourite photo. Apparently he likes looking up elephant noses. I liked another one better so to avoid conflict you get to see both.

All jokes aside I am so very thrilled to welcome a new baby to that ring of people that dwell close to the heart. I hope and pray that his new little owner has a wonderful life and that she grows to love and appreciate the beautiful family she has been born into.

Well it feels like winning isn’t this little guy just amazing! He was crocheted by the incredibly talented Kelly from Kelgell Creations He He He I can’t get over how cute he is. She even went to the bother of finding out a little about me before choosing what she was going to make, read the note it just made me feel so special.

This is the book I am reading at the moment and it is packed full of dragons. My good friend Jo got me reading this series and I just have to tell the world, because it is so amazingly cool, that her little boy Finn has just today been officially declared in remission for cancer!!!

The little dragon is also just the right size for cuddles

So a huge thankyou to Tab for organizing this swap if you would like to see what everyone else has created head over to her site Small Things and have a peek. Mine is still in the mail so I can’t show you what I made just yet.  And a huge thank you to Kelly this little dragon will be well loved here.                   ,

We are joining an interactive envelope window display, cool hey!

It’s another fun play along from Pip at Meet Me At Mikes my second crush in the blogging world.

What you do is decorate an envelope and send it to Pip who runs Meet Me At Mikes, a shop in Melbourne. The envelopes are to be filled with all sorts of left over, useful and pretty crafty stuff. Pip will display all of the envelopes in her shop window for 6 weeks then one envelope will be randomly drawn and all the other envelopes full of goodness will be sent to them. We have no real dilutions of winning but it’s kinda pleasant to reach out and send nice things to a stranger far away. Lani, my 8 year old is really getting into it, they’re her hands decorating the envelope in the photo.

If you would like to send an envelope to Pip CLICK HERE to read her post about it.

I also joined a softie swap that Tab from Small Things is graciously organizing. Only just as I started my sewing machine exploded, well sort off GGRRRRED then WHRRRRRED and then refused to go up and down so I am hand sewing my softie. As soon as I can get it finished my softie will be heading over to Talia at Life’s Visual Journal. I can’t show you what I am makeing because it’s a secret Shhhhhh!!!! but you should pop over and check out Talia’s rainbow cupcakes they look spectacular only my brain wont stop jumping off the walls just from viewing the image. If we do make them it’ll be a day when we can stay at home all day till the effects wear off

This little flower sprite was for a baby dedication

I was aiming for the type of flower sprite that could hide in the garden and appear to be a blossom so I thought petals for hair might work. When she was all finished Lani skips into the room, takes one look at her and asks,

"why did you make Fifi the Flowertot?"

Blahhh. But I still think she looks cute peeping out of her bag, rip off of popular kids character or not.

To any of the uninitiated out there Miss Mousy Moo and her hodgepodge of friends are all made from air drying clay which is just the best stuff for entertaining bored little fingers.

The amount of focus that poured out of Lilly during this craft blew me away. The mouse and the snail in the foreground are hers, along with a bunch of lady birds and a cake and pizza. She even researched before she began looking through a few of the twenty odd craft books I have scattered around various book shelves. It is the most focused and dedicated to a task I have ever seen her and I am going to turn back fondly to these photos the next time she turns into a whirling dervish and runs straight into the sharp pointy corner of a wall.
 

Lani on the other hand jumped straight into squeezing the gooey stuff between her fingers. I think she found the squidging squelching and squashing way too appealing to actually stop and waste time forming the clay into recognisable objects. For a while the only thing she had finished was the slug you can see slap bang in the centre of the photo. Sorry to be a bother but I’m going to ask you to scroll back up and have a look…go on have a peek… right now imagine it painted a brownish colour and you can imagine how flustered Glenn was when he came home from work and she was all "Daddy Look What I Made"

Of course she did get productive eventually and made a large red thing with toothpicks in it and a heart pendant for a necklace which she painted pink (Like duh as if any other colour ever existed)

It was naturally Eli’s idea to embed the spiky toothpicks into the art works, I had put them out on the table in the hope that they would be used to create otherwise unachievable intricate details, but I suppose a giant blue echidna is a great use for them too.

We also made some wooden spoon puppets aren’t they just so sweet, well, other than Lilly’s demon possessed yellow glowy eyed one.

And major thrill of these holidays we had a very special blue bear sleep over and stay up way to late with our fuzzy brown lot, but that’s the point of a sleep over really isn’t it.

One Red Robin, a gorgeous site by a very talented softie maker that I had been reading through all the yucky months, started imploring all the crafty people to make toys for something called Softies for Mirabel and Linked to a site called Meet Me At Mikes for more info. Meet me at Mikes is a great place to visit and to say that it is updated daily is the biggest understatement of the year, Pip is prolific on the internets with all things crafty and nice to look at.

What is ‘Softies for Mirabel’?
Softies for Mirabel is our annual appeal to benefit the kids supported by The Mirabel Foundation. We send word out via the internet, inviting people like you to make a soft toy (or two!) The toys are gifted to the Mirabel kids as part of The Mirabel Foundation’s Toy Drive.

Due to the rapid production of children I really haven’t done anything creative since leaving Uni, Oh art degree, what have I done to you??? So I was a bit hesitant as to my ability to make anything worth letting another person look at, but when i read the post over at Pip’s about the Mirabel foundation and what it does to support children who’s lives have been turned upside down by drugs I just had to give it ago.

This was Last years attempt and I really enjoyed making her. I used to make soft toys all the time when I was a kid, never being able to find the character that I was currently reading about at the shops.  I always envisioned my house full of home made goodness but my creative side got packed up in a box somewhere and lost in one of the many times we have moved house. I will be making another Softie for Mirabel this year and hopefully many more things. Head over to Pip’s to learn more about this wonderful foundation.

The poor sewing machine is still in the hospital having his knob seen to, so it has taken me a little longer than the one night promised to finish this doll. The little girl who was in the car accident turned up for half a day today and collected the mountain of get well gifts off her desk. When Lani told me this as I was helping her into the car this afternoon I thought she was going to be upset because we didn’t get our little contribution finished in time. But thankfully Lani saw the positive side declaring that it was wonderful because

"if she feels well enough to come back tomorrow she will get one more surprise gift from me".

I feel like I forgot to bring in my homework only to discover that the teacher is away sick. Yay for patient and forgiving daughters.

The doll christened Suny because "That’s a happy name" is posing with the original design by Lani. We are giving the drawing to the little girl as well.

We hope the little girl enjoys her happy doll and we are sending prayers for a speedy recovery her way.