Matchbox Doll House and Rocket Ship - Recycled Cereal Box Craft

I don't know if you've seen the tiny travelling doll's house, made by Trixi, at Coloured Buttons, but it's absolutely adorable. I knew as soon as I saw it, that I would have to make one for each of the girls. My only problem was a lack of matchboxes. We had one box in the kitchen, but it was full of matches, and I thought my husband might frown on me dumping it out, to use for a craft.

I was completely roadblocked, and had just about given up on the thought, when it occurred to me, that if I could make a round box out of cereal box cardboard, I could probably just as easily make my own matchboxes.

I actually ended up temporarily dumping out the kitchen matches, so I could take the box apart, and use it as a template. Though, I was very careful with the box, so I could glue it back together, and refill it with matches, when I was done.

The nice side effect of making my own boxes, was that I was able to attach the fabric I wanted on the inside, and outside of the houses, while they were still flat pieces.

I used a combination of Elmer's glue, and hot glue, for putting my houses together.

I love the little button flowers that Trixi used on her house, but I'm pretty sure my little ones would rip those off, and eat them, so I went with some fabric kittens, cut from a printed piece of material, instead.

For the boys, I made rocket ships, leaving the boxes fairly plain. I added tinfoil to the interior, and a few geometrically cut pieces of fun foam to the outside.

The boxes are a pretty tight fit, and the triangles on the rocket bottom holds them in as well, so I don't think they'll fall open, even if worn on a string around the neck.

I made each of the houses, and rockets, tiny pillows, and crocheted blankets, and sock doll inhabitants.

Now all that is left to do, is to add some sort of string, or necklace, for easy carrying, and they'll be ready for Christmas.

It's great to be a homeschooler.

Turn Black Friday Ads Into Chinese Yo-Yos For a Thanksgiving Weekend Boredom Buster

The turkey has been eaten, the dishes are done, and the kids are bored. What's a mother to do? Grab up the glossy Black Friday ads, and make Chinese yo-yos, of course. I mean really, the sales aren't that spectacular anyway, and it's like getting a door prize, without trudging out to the stores at five in the morning.

We started experimenting tonight with a mini yo-yo prototype.

We used a 4 inch piece of wooden skewer, and a strip of newspaper, one and three quarters of an inch wide, by about 21 inches, or the width of an open page of ad.

We secured the strip of paper to the stick with packing tape.

Then, we wrapped it tightly around the stick, and our yo-yo was ready to go.

Below is a grainy, no sound video, of my left handed attempt to demonstrate the yo-yo, while filming at the same time (and no, I am not left handed, so needless to say, the yo-yo works better than it appears).

We continued experimenting by taping on more strips, for additional length. And, we made a larger size with a wood dowel, and strips of glossy newspaper taped together to make a strip, that was 4'' by 7'. They don't work quite as well as the store bought variety my husband, and I remember from our youth. In fact, my husband went out to the garage for a while, and returned with his old (30 year old) yo-yo. It did work better, but only a little. And really, it had been wound tightly for a long, long time, while our new yo-yos had only been wound for a few minutes before we put them to use.

I've heard of these being made with wrapping paper. But, why waste good paper, when there are so many ads just lying around?

It's great to be a homeschooler.

Dressing Tiny Sock Dolls

The simple, no sew solution, to dressing a tiny sock doll, is to use the cuff left over from making the doll. This works especially well if the cuff is frilly, or decorative. Turn the cuff, so the frilly part is down, and cut a couple of slits for the dolls arms to fit through. Slip the cuff onto the doll, and turn down the top part, to make a collar. You might want to add a few quick stitches, to hold the collar in place, but this is not absolutely necessary.

If you do not have a pretty cuff to make a dress out of, or if you prefer a dress with sleeves to cover the arm seams of the doll, then the process is a little more complicated - but only a little.

Start with a scrap of fabric as wide as the doll's outstretched arms, and slightly more than twice the length you want for the dress. If you don't want to sew a hem, then trim around the fabric with pinking shears.

Fold the fabric in half. Cut a half circle in the middle of the fold, and slip it over the head of the doll, with the right sides in.

Hand stitch around the doll, from the bottom edge of the dress, up to, and around, the bottom of the arm, on both sides of the doll.

Slip the dress off of the doll, and turn it right side out. Then, place it back on the doll, and run a gathering stitch around the collar (just a real loose in and out stitch, all the way around, that you pull tight, and tie off at the end). Trim the sleeves with pinking shears, or hem to the desired length, and you are done.

If the dress looks too plain to you, you can always fancy it up, with a bit of lace or ribbon.

For a boy doll, or alien, follow the same instructions above, but stitch an upside down "v", up from the bottom edge, between the legs, to make pants. And, run a quick stitch, back and forth, through the middle of doll, once you have the outfit the right way out, to create a waistline.

And, just in case you are making an alien, or an astronaut, the bottom half, of the plastic bubble, that toys come in from grocery store vending machines - works pretty well, for a tiny space helmet.

It's great to be a homeschooler.

Happy Thanksgiving

It's a good day to be...

...Thankful!

Give thanks to the Lord, call on His name; make known among the nations what He has done. 1Chronicles 16:8

I Know An Old Lady Who Swallowed A Pie - Paper Bag Puppet Activity

I was sorting through the kids' books last night, in search of The Night Before Thanksgiving by Natasha Wing, when I came across Alison Jackson's I Know An Old Lady Who Swallowed a Pie, instead. I was happy to find it, because there was an activity I'd been meaning to do with the little ones, involving this book, and with Thanksgiving closing in fast, it was nearly too late.

A few weeks ago, Michelle, over at A Mommy's Adventures, used the I Know An Old Lady Who Swallowed a Bat book, for a story and art project, and I knew right away, we'd have to do something similar with this book. So, this morning, I printed out a picture of The Old Lady from Marcias Lesson Links, for the children to cut out and color. I decided to use a different face for the Old Lady, one that I thought looked a little more like the illustrations in the book. I'd give you the link for that one, but for the life of me, I haven't been able to find it again, and it garbled on my printout. But be assured, it's out there somewhere, free for the printing.

I also printed out pictures of the Thanksgiving food the Old Lady ate from MakingLearningFun.com.

After the little ones colored The Old Lady we glued her to a lunch size paper bag, with a slit in the mouth for the food to go in. We taped a plastic Ziploc bag inside the paper bag, so it could catch the food placed into the puppet.

Finally, one of the older girls read the story, while the little ones placed the food into the puppet's mouth.

Just in case you would like to do this activity, but can't get your hands on the book, there is a copy of the complete poem "I Know An Old Lady Who Swallowed a Pie", here.

It's great to be a homeschooler.

How to Curl Yarn for Doll Hair

It turns out that transforming straight limp pieces of yarn into cute, perfect little boingable curls for dolls, is incredibly simple.

Wrap the yarn tightly around a knitting needle. I used a standard, Red Heart, worsted weight yarn. The size and thickness of the needle will depend on the size of the doll for which you're making the hair. For our tiny sock dolls, I wrapped the yarn around wooden kitchen skewers. Tie the yarn tightly at the ends - I started out with a slip knot, and ended off by casting on a stitch, as for knitting.

Wet the yarn on the needles. I used boiling water from an instant hot water tap, but because heat will be applied in the next step, I don't think the temperature of the water matters.

Place the wet, yarn covered needles, or skewers on a cookie sheet, and put them in the oven at 200 degrees Fahrenheit. I put mine into a cold oven let it preheat while they were in. That took three minutes. Then, I turned the oven off, and left them in for an additional three minutes. Keep a close on the yarn in the oven, you wouldn't want to catch your oven on fire, just for the sake of doll's hair.

After the yarn cools, remove it from the needles, either sliding it off the end, or unwinding it, and cut it to the the desired lengths.

For the yarn dolls, I tied four, or five curls together, and sewed them on to the dolls head with the lose ends of the yarn that I had tied them together with. It took two to three clusters of curls per doll, which was about four skewers worth of curled yarn. To finish off the dolls hair, I trimmed the front curls short, for bangs.

For the yarn aliens, I used four shorter curls, tied together, and sewed to the center top of the dolls' heads. I also gave them plastic bubble helmets for space travel (we wouldn't want any one's eyes getting sucked out by the atmosphere of alien planets), but I'll tell you more about that in another post.

It's great to be a homeschooler.

How to Make a Tiny Sock Doll

To make a tiny sock doll, start with a tiny sock (how's that for a "duh"), just don't make it too tiny, or you'll end up with a fat little x, instead of a doll. The socks I used were some my three year old has outgrown, so let's say they were a size 24 months, or 2T, or somewhere thereabouts.

Cut the toe off of the sock, so the toe seam stays with it. Cut the toe piece in half. These will make the arms. Then, cut off the foot of the sock, at the heel line. And, I am sorry about a couple of these pictures, it took me a while to get the hang of shooting them at night (after the children were asleep), but being a visual learner myself, I know there are some of you out there, who would prefer a blurry picture, to no picture at all.

Set the cuff aside for later, and sew up, and stuff the arms, by sewing the length of each toe piece together, turning and stuffing them, and then sewing the ends closed.

With the heel end of the sock body pointing up, cut a slit in the bottom of the piece to form legs.

Sew the legs closed, rounding them to look like the legs of a gingerbread man.

Turn the piece inside out, and stuff it with poly-fil.

With a double thread, stitch a loose basting stitch around the body, midway between the top, and the legs.

Pull the thread tight to gather in the neck. Run an additional row of stitching around the neck, to secure the gather, and tie off. Or, poke the remaining thread through to the shoulder, and use it to sew on an arm.

Sew on the arms by whip stitching both the front, and the back sides of them to the body.

Embroider a face, and close up the head with another gathering stitch along the top edge, just as for the neck. Faces are not my strong point - so I just made two black horizontal stitches for eyes, and one red horizontal stitch for a mouth.

Your doll is now ready for clothing, hair, and possibly a house - but you'll have to wait until tomorrow to read about those - just now, I have a pumpkin pie, and a cranberry crumble cheesecake to attend to - afterall, we only have two turkeys left to put on our turkey tree!

It's great to be a homeschooler.