Daddy/Daughter Time and More Art

Really, though, isn't there always art.  Peyton enjoyed some Daddy-Time though as Kaitlyn sat at the table doing various activities and I stayed nearby so she wouldn't throw paint or glue on the ceiling.  I did manage to get some cleaning done in the process!

Keith thinks it is so awesome how well she is sitting now.  He missed out on three weeks of progress with it and she is just barely wobbly at all now.

Every time she would wobble a bit, he would reach out ready to catch her.

She was so disturbed by the camera that I just let them alone to enjoy their time together.

Kaitlyn decided yesterday she needed to be pretty much constantly entertained.  There wasn't a minute of independent playtime to her day.  This is pretty odd for her.  She normally plays for about half an hour on her own in the morning and then another hour in the evening.  I hadn't really prepped any activities for her either because with Keith back home I thought she might be happy to just play with him for awhile.  Such an optimist.

I cut a paper plate she had painted to make her a mask and glued it to a popsicle stick.  She thought it was awesome.  Funny how the simplest things are totally amazing to a toddler...

We reused some art she had previously done and she glued embellishments on it.

We made more butterflies and I put one on a stick for her to play with.  That didn't go over so well as she just got upset about it being stuck and I had to take it off again!

And stamps...  this cheap little set from Oriental Trading Company is her favorite stamp set.  They are self-inking and she can remove the lids and put them back on herself.  It's a completely independent craft for us now that she doesn't put them in her mouth, but I do stay nearby.  The only problem is that they are NOT washable.  She gets it on her fingers and touches her face often.  I suppose a little staining isn't the end of the world.

Yes, we had a busy day being Satonic yesterday...  and after the girls were off to bed, I had a little project of my own.  Recently, within the past few days, I was searching for a spot in my pantry to put a sticky trap for the spider crickets that are trying to make their way into our home.  During all the crawling and bumping of my head on various objects, I discovered some very-very-VERY-OLD pasta that has probably been with us longer than we have owned the house.  I didn't realize just how long that pasta had been sitting around waiting for us to eat it...  I always grab at the whole wheat or garden pasta boxes now that Kaitlyn eats real food and just kept that stuff for backup.

If you remember as a kid making those pasta necklaces and macaroni art, you probably remember just how much fun that was (though now I have no clue at all as to why I was entertained).  I had no idea how you go about dyeing pasta, but a quick google search showed me that vinegar or rubbing alcohol and food coloring is all you need.  I needed to buy some food coloring anyhow, so I dyed some pasta last night and let it dry/air out.

Kaitlyn has a book called Rainbow Delight.  It was a cheap little find at the grocery store bargain bin, but she just loves that book.  This is also a cheap little trick that she loves so far.  You can see I tried to do the whole ROYGBIV thing, but the last two colors I'm not so sure are an accurate reflection of the rainbow.  I was kind of guessing on the ratios of blue to red...  I probably should have googled it!  This is a TON of pasta, but what else are you going to do with expired and ancient pasta?  Some of it can't be threaded because it was just a random grouping of boxes I had, but we can use it for art still.

She doesn't care though.  It's only the perfectionist in me that is bothered.  I tied some yarn to a q-tip so that she could thread the larger noodles.  She really really enjoyed this.  Peyton was happily playing until I distracted her with the flash...

I tied off a necklace for her, but she wasn't really interested.  She took it off and handed it to me and started threading the second string of yarn, so I think we won't make anymore necklaces for awhile.  She can just thread them and I'll take them back off for her to rethread.  She was not happy when we had to take the pasta away.  I probably shouldn't have introduced this activity only an hour before she had to go upstairs for her bath.

Reorganized!  From bottom left to top right.  A container for art.  They either can't be threaded or would have to be threaded on fishing line which I am not okay with Kaitlyn using at this time.  Then there is a container of stringing pastas and a container with some pasta and cups to be used for sorting games.  And then a basket of extra pasta that I'm really not sure what I'll be doing with at this point.  It was really a lot of pasta, but I didn't want to just throw it out.  I'm sure she will be back to stringing pasta tomorrow.

4.5 months and 22 months, pictured.

Such a happy and active baby!

I think this is pretty much Kaitlyn's favorite way to hug Peyton.

<3

My girls!

Little Sister

HAH!

Alright mom, camera out of our face, let us play.

Painted Butterflies, Paper Wings.

I had been meaning to get around to this one for a bit, but I always forgot to pick up pipe cleaners.  Towelflies were something you would see a lot in school when I was young.  It seemed like every class but mine would do this project and I was always so jealous when I saw the pretty butterflies the other girls would show off.  And about ten minutes later, some new catastrophe would take precedence.  Ah, youth!

Since I didn't have as many chances to do this project as I would have liked, I plan to let Kaitlyn make as many "towelflies" as she could possibly want!  After all, it's practically a free craft.  A few days ago, she made her first.  Right now it is hanging happily in the living room, but we are going to transfer the whole lot of them into her playroom once we have made a grouping of them.  I've no doubt she'll love seeing them hanging there everyday!

Dip your folded paper towel in liquid paints!

(Stop to see if it makes a good paintbrush...)

When it's been dipped to your satisfaction, squeeze the excess liquid out and then lay out to dry.

Moved to a better spot, along with some more of the days' painting work.  And she is on the other side of the easel drawing.  I am not exaggerating when I say my daughter is an art addict.

Once dry, wrap your pipe cleaner around the center.  I showed her how to wrap the "antenna" around my finger to give it curls!  She had a blast flapping it around the room.

Next time we'll try for some more vibrant coloring!

Entertaining a toddler, thoughts and ideas, past success.

I am always on the lookout for activities suitable for young kids.  Anyone with a toddler is, surely.  It doesn't take much to entertain my four month old, but things do become more complicated!  It's much more fun (not to mention more financially savvy) to do activities than it is to buy a new toy every week.

One thing we both enjoy is to relate her favorite books to her real life.  If we are eating strawberries or pears or any number of items, we talk about how The Very Hungry Caterpillar also ate these items.  Then we count how many we are eating.  Or, if I happen to find turkey that will soon go bad in my fridge, some pesto in the same state and a few eggs - we can turn breakfast into a fun reminder of a book!

Green eggs and "ham"!  She couldn't tell it was turkey because the pesto was really the overriding flavor.  I used 3 eggs, a slice of cheese, a couple spoons of pesto and about half of the turkey I had left and it was absolutely delicious.  I gave Kaitlyn a third of it and she really loved it.  She kept chanting Thank you Thank you Ham Ham Ham, which is what she says when we get to the last page of the book.  (I do so like green eggs and ham. Thank you, thank you, Sam I Am.  Oops, spoilers!!!)

I get asked a lot how I can stand to let Kaitlyn paint so often, sometimes 3 sessions in one day!  The kid is an addict.  My neighbors can see when we have painted because I hang her pieces on the easel to dry and open the windows to speed the process on nice days, at least pulling the curtains open so they don't brush on the paint (the easel is by the window for natural light).  One of my neighbors is a grandmother and often watches the little ones at her house, and she just boggles that we paint everyday because she hates it.

It doesn't really bother me hugely, honestly, the clean up.  It does get a bit annoying at times with how often we do it, but I just start each session with set up, which includes running a clean sink halfway full of warm soapy water.  At the end, everything gets tossed into the sink until I can deal with it and I wipe Kaitlyn's hands enough to get her to the bathroom where I wash her well and use the nail brush (she loves to help brush her fingernails, which actually causes me to have to clean paint off the sink, mirror and walls - but they have to learn so I let her).  Crayola washable paints are a life saver for me, as well.  It has even come out of my carpet when we've had a mishap.  It's old terrible carpet though, so who really cares if it stained at this point.

I'm sure if Kaitlyn were a wild child, things would be different.  Peyton may cause problems, who knows.  Or maybe having 2 painting at once will be mind-numbingly difficult!  I keep thinking to myself how much I would love to finish off our utility room, reorganize and use a certain corner as an "art studio" so to speak.  Somewhere they could really have fun and the mess could just wait until I could get to it, basically.  There are so many things to be done to this house, however, that an art studio just isn't in the works.

One of our recent projects was a ball run.  Not a marble run as I have a four month old and thus, no marbles shall cross my threshold.  It's a larger ball so I couldn't use the normal paper towel tube combo. I picked out a piece of cardboard and taped the sides that I cut to remove it from its parent box.  If you've ever sliced yourself on cardboard, you understand why I did that.  Then I folded, cut and glued some recyclables and made sure everything would fit on the main cardboard piece.  

With older children, they can help with that part.  Kaitlyn will not be cutting cardboard for awhile though, so this was a mommy moment with the project.  Notice I taped the plastic bottle that got cut down, you don't want those little fingers sliced open!  You can't really see, but I took a cereal box and cut the front mostly off, taped some ramps in it and then covered it with wax paper to keep the ball from tumbling off the front.  I cut some holes in the cardboard pieces so that she could see the ball racing along even from straight on.  This was a wasted effort since she has to stand to put the ball in so isn't watching from a low angle.

Anyhow, I took all the smaller pieces and put them away.  The next day, Kaitlyn was able to paint her main cardboard piece.  She should have some part in it!  I also let her use markers on the other cardboard pieces, but she pushed them away pretty quickly in favor of coloring the paper underneath, which is perfectly acceptable.  After the paint dried, we went out front  and mod-podged the pieces on. Kaitlyn decided to "paint" the entire cardboard with mod-podge and I think we may have inspired the neighborhood kids to build their own ball runs with the spectacle.

I wish I had pictures of it because it was a fun process, but trying to keep a one-year-old from stepping all over a sticky glue surface while she "paints" it with more glue...  well, you try taking pictures of that without help!  It was great fun though.  I'm not sure if mod-podge fumes are really a problem, from what I read they are not, but since it was nice out and the baby was napping, we just made an outside activity of it.

She really covered the whole surface pretty thoroughly, so it didn't dry in time for her to play that night.  In this photo you can see some white spots that still were not dry and also the cereal box triple ramp.

She really loves it.  It's great entertainment for her while I am cooking and I love to hear her run around yelling MY PAINT! BALLS GO! MY PAINT! BALLS GO! after she drops the balls down it (normally all 3 at once hah!).  I have had to make some minor repairs to it since she uses it so often, but it's a throw away item anyhow.  We'll just recycle it when it's finished.

We'll have so much fun when she's older and can help more and then I'm sure she'll enjoy this when she is old enough to plan it out, build it herself and really make larger scale runs!

Apparently I have a plog.

The term blog is shortened from "web log".  I think this is turning into less of a blog and more of a plog, a "photo log".  This is okay though.  A few ideas and events to share today.  Be aware it's a toddler sort of post rather than a baby post...

First, sharing an idea I got from someone else.  Toddler busy boxes!  We love busy boxes.  The best part is that you can actually use those millions of toys you likely buy or receive, when otherwise they can just sit around being ignored.

She always loves opening her busy boxes.

(From this picture you might think she was terrified!)

Today's box of flash cards!

Yes, she has enough flash cards sets that each

of 12 boxes has flash cards in it.  I know...

Monster truck.  Because girls can play trucks too.

Also in this box are bouncy jacks, wooden castanets,

a light-up football, little books and small puzzles.

All great stuff that was getting ignored until I

packaged them in this way!

Additionally, here was a great idea I got from a friend.  I am always looking for new painting ideas and often end up buying different supplies to keep the experience fresh (though sometimes I think even just plain old painting every day would be enough for her).  I hadn't really thought to use items I already have around to embellish on our daily painting ritual!

Cotton balls!  I put a ball by each plate...

but apparently this plate deserved 

all of the balls and the other 

plates need not have any...

And this cotton ball desired to be pushed around

by a q-tip, don't you know?  I thought the q-tips

would be fun for a bit of pointillism, but Kaitlyn

decided otherwise!

For example, forming a painted

q-tip committee was considered.

But then it was decided they could be put to 

better use to decorate the plastic cup 

she was using to make circles.

Oh, but it always comes to this.  Nothing beats

the feeling of goopy paint squelching

between your fingers!

Painting at the table is alright.

But sometimes it's better to get up out of the chair!

Since she kept calling "easel, easel", we moved

things into the kitchen.  Always a risk, but fun.

Dirty, dirty hands.

Dirty, dirty tray.

But so easily cleaned!  I'm going

to go ahead and brag on the Ikea

MÅLA easel.  Blackboard, dry erase

board, tray, paper roll, folds flat.

I love the thing.  The only

improvement I would make

would be to add clips.

Baby clothes hangars make a suitable substitution though!

And just a proud mommy moment.  I have no idea

how long she has been doing this, but Kaitlyn has

developed a three fingered grip for drawing!

I wasn't sure when to start working on it,

so I skipped it and she figured it out.

I adore my kids!

Contact paper painting

Kaitlyn's favorite activity is art.  And of art, her absolute favorite thing to do is paint.  She asks to paint practically every day.  It's hard to keep something new and interesting when it gets brought out all-the-time!  And so, I have discovered a million different ways to paint.  Maybe that's a trifle exaggerated.  We paint with brushes, fingers, toothpick dots, pieces of styrofoam, stamps, we do relief painting, canvas painting, oh my at the painting.

If she wants to paint her hands, I let her.  If she paints the table, so be it.  Some paint on the carpet, well it's old and needs replacing anyhow!  About the only thing I refuse to let her do is hit the paintbrush on the table because I really don't want to be getting paint off the ceiling.  I think sometime soon we'll go out front with some paper and I'll let her really just throw the paint on it.  I can always hose her the yard down afterwards!

Today we painted on contact paper, a double fun activity.  You get the sticky awesomeness of contact paper and the satisfying goop of paint, plus a see-through end product that we like to hold up to the light and admire.  She absolutely loves her art wall.  At least five times a day, I get to hear "Art! Mama I paint!"  Yes, Kaitlyn made that art.  You painted it.  "Watee!"  Yes, you painted that one with water.  Etc, etc.  I don't know why she doesn't tire of having the same conversation over and over!

Since we do some sort of art every day (usually painting), I end up having to take down projects to display her newer pieces.  It breaks my heart to throw things away, so I end up saving many.  This is a giant cheerios box of art.  I think I'm going to get a tote for each of the girls and keep some of their art in them.  There's so much, though.  The task of deciding what's worth keeping is not one I want.  It's all worth keeping if you ask me.  Every single piece is a fun memory, how do you toss them out.

Ah, if only my storage space was infinite.

After awhile she told me she was done, so I plopped a second piece of contact paper over the first, took it off the table and taped a big sheet of easel paper down for her.  I like to let her tell me when she is done with her art rather than deciding for her usually.  I don't really think art is something that has to completely fill a surface and if I don't want to give her that idea by requiring she fill the paper with color.  Blank spaces can be just as expressive, if you ask me.  If she only partially uses a piece of paper, I set it aside and use it later for showing her letters and numbers or for when she wants me to draw things for her...  I hate to just waste it.

Today she decided to paint her hand (something I showed her to do so she could make handprints) and also tried painting with the "wrong" side of the brush.  It was so funny when she realized it wasn't working out so well.  "OH NO!  MAMA!  OH NO!"

Pretty soon I'll be doing this with two of them!  When I am reminded of Kaitlyn's first art experiences, I both look forward to and dread Peyton getting started with it.  Who's to say she will even take to it the way Kaitlyn did, but I'll definitely try to get her interested.  Oh my, Kaitlyn would be covered head to toe in paint very early on.  I suppose I'll be going back to the homemade paints until I can trust Peyton not to put a brush in her mouth.  Even with the nontoxic Crayola paints, I don't want them eating the stuff!  Edible paint it is.  I have a few months yet, at least.