Teacher craft in process

I saw this cute birthday countdown calender (on Pinterest I think) but the sign holder- although very cute- is like 8 bucks at office depot.

Kinda blowing my cheapie budget considering I was thinking of making at least 6 of these, maybe more like a dozen.

But then I looked up and saw this

Remember I had made it awhile back? So I had hubby drill the holes and I made this:

(sorry for the blurry photo – too lazy busy to take another one). I used the binder rings and lots of stickers and scrapbooking leftovers. The numbers are these big black old stickers I have had fovever. I used the cropadile to punch the holes and computer printed a bunch of holidays so the teachers can just change out the holiday bit. The hard part (because math and logic is hard for me) was figuring out what number to go on the back so that once the cards are flipped to the back, they can be turned around on the rings as needed. (Boy, that makes no sense- I mean I wanted to use both sides of the cards as effectively as possible)

Then I got the bright idea that since this would be in a class there would be lots of grubby paws on it so I laminated each number card. But that created some issues. Since I had not originally calculated the laminated edging into the size, each card was too long now and I had to trim each card before laminating and then trim and round the corners with scissors because no one has made a frigging corner rounder that work on lamination (I wish to heck I could patent that idea and make a fortune!). And rounding the corners always makes me grumpy because they never look identical. ugh (ok, just me, right?) I also used the cropadile once again to re-punch the holes.

And it seems that in a fit of purging I let go all my clear acrylic frames and none of the thriftstores have ANY all of a sudden. I got one from Dollar General but it is kinda flimsy. Will try it and let ya know how it goes.

My plan is to pound these out over thanksgiving weekend and gift them to the teachers on the 12th day before the end of school before winter break when I start my 12 days of gifting. (other gifts I have set aside: bacon chocolate bars, chalkboard spraypainted mugs, chalk pens, chalkboard thought bubbles- still have to make those- fleece blankets with names on them, our annual xmas music cd and more).

crafting with a 4 yr old

With Christmas less than 100 days away crafting is in full swing.

I got some little flat wooden hearts at Michael’s (thank you, 40% off coupon) and sprayed them with chalkboard paint (define obsession- I am not obsessed *twitch twitch*). Some I punched with my handy dandy cropodile (I was skerred but it punch right through like buttah!) and will use those as gift tags and some I am glueing to clothespins and will pin a gift’s ribbons (that sounds confusing – I just wanted tag options)

Then I had a craft fail (I stuck some cork tiles on some more kitchen cabinet doors and for some reason they made the cabinet doors not close all the way- ugh- so I ripped them off) but I made lemonade outta lemons. I traced the little chalkboard hearts and cut them out with scissors, punched cropadile holes in them and was going to leave it at that but . . . we had the glitter out and, ya know, I have glitter in my veins! They kinda look like sugar cookie ornaments now.

So, Miss Crafty 4 year old painted on the glue and I poured on the glitter (sorry, she is not to be trusted with a paper plate full of glitter on her own!) I used modge podge instead of elmers just because when I cleaned my craft closet recently I discovered a plethora (a plethora I say!!) of bottles of modge podge.

But then we had this leftover glue and glitter and the pile of clothespins was RIGHT THERE. Before I knew what happened we had glittered tiny, small and regular sized clothespins. Not sure what to do with them other than glue magnets to the back and gift them out at the holidays.

Glitter ornaments

My friend Billie (BLOG) sent me this video. It shows how to use wood floor cleaner and fine glitter to make these really cute balls.

I looked around the house and found Zap (Home Depot Brand) wood floor cleaner in a cabinet and tried it. I used non Martha Stewart brand fine glitters and it worked just fine (pun intended.

My non crafty brother in law even did one! (His turned out the best of the bunch! And it was pink!!) These were super easy. BUT I am glad that the clear balls I had were nice sturdy ones from Michael’s. They are meant to be handled and crafted with so they are thicker. You can take off the hook cap easily and the edges are smooth, not sharp.

I have worked with other balls that were much thinner with sharp edges under the cap. Again this year I sorted through all my old xmas balls and took out the plain colored ones that were scratched and old looking. A rinse in dishwashing liquid soapy water and the outer color comes right off. A soak and a swish (I used a bit of paper towel inside for agitation) with bleach water takes the inner silvering off. BUT the opening is often jagged sharp and the balls are thinner are require more delicate handling. A good trash to treasure thing but not exactly a good kid craft.

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Xmas '08 revisited

A couple of cool things we did that I wanted to keep in mind for next year.
1. The cool snowman ornaments we made. Got the idea from here and bought an enormous amount of white Crayola craft clay. We cheated a bit and used orange clay for the nose and sharpied the eyes on but they came out great.
2. Hand painted tool box - 5$ yardsale find and I turned the kids loose with sharpie markers on it. My favorite bit was where I traced all of our hands on the back and had the kids wriote their names.
3. Santa still rocks! Party at our house again next year!!
D