Sight Words: Colors and Sentence Recognition

Harmony is now in Kindergarten and she loves it!  She is doing very well and comes home every day with a wonderful story.

  Surprisingly, she gets quite a bit of homework.  She has been tasked this week in practicing her "color" sight words, and the word "the".  

I made these sight word cards for her on Microsoft Word then I printed them out and Mod Podged them onto scrapbook paper.

I made sure to include sentence use on the back so she could see how the word is properly used in text.  We have been using them all week and I feel that she is doing really well with absorbing the information.

Here is the free template for the Sight Words.  I made them small so they wouldn't be overwhelming.  You can each item on a 2 x 2 inch piece of scrapbook paper.

Autumn's coming! :)

Candice S

Sight Words Colors 2011

Simple & Elegant Picture Puzzle

Love my puzzle, cause I do!  :)

Supplies needed:

Left over gift boxes from Christmas

Some Mod Podge and a itsy bitsy brush

Scissors

Apply a thin layer to your gift box and set a family picture or whatever type of picture your heart desires onto your gift box.  This will allow the puzzle to become sturdier, somewhat like card stock.

I applied a layer of mod podge to "seal" the photo from moisture and oils that are on our fingers.  It can actually ruin the photo.  After that, WAAA LAAAA!  Trace your puzzle shapes onto the back of the picture and cutout with X-acto Knife or scissors.

That's all you need to create this beautiful puzzle.  I was so impressed with how it came out.  Harmony's loves putting it together.

I am going to be posting a recyling series on multiple outlets that you can use to recycle a lot of household goods and use them for school activities, craft activites, and even decor!  There are so many idea's floating around out there that I can't wait to share with you.

Have a great Tuesday!

Candice S.

Ballerina Wand

 Harmony begged Santa to bring her a ballerina wand like Angelina Ballerina's.. but Santa couldn't find one.  :(  ... What to do, what to do..  Mommy to the rescue!  

I took a dowel and covered it with a mixture of silver glitter and Mod Podge.  I have done this so many times before and it comes out so pretty when you mix the Mod Podge with glitter!  

Then I took some red ribbon from our Christmas box and started wrapping the end of the dowel until I had a decent length for my "Angelina" to twirl around with.  

I hot glued some gems onto the ribbon but we've been slowly removing them.  They provide a little sting when you're twirling spastically and get hit with one.  So beware of its beauty and the possibility that may want to decorate the dowel with jewels and not the ribbon itself. 

 This is just another of the many lessons in the life of crafting that I have learned.

Then you can.. "Get down, get down, get down!"  

Have a wonderful weekend!

Candice S.

Martha's AMAZING Newspaper Tree's!!!

Is this not the neatest idea, EVER?  Thank you, Martha Stewart for sharing this wonderful creation with us!   

How beautiful and unique.. and out of newspaper and glue!  The possibilities for the creation of this unique tree is endless.  You can use other tree materials, such as felt or foil, if you don't want to recycle that old newspaper! 

For more information on how to make this Christmas Craft click here.

Merry Christmas!!!

Candice S.

Christmas Sensory Box

We always have fun coming up with new idea's for a sensory table, and/or, box. Harmony adores her small toys and I love her using them so they don't end up in the vacuum or trash.

This Christmas Sensory Box helped us use our growing (way beyond expanding) box of lids and caps so we were super excited about that!!!  We made the Christmas shapes using cookie cutters, we decorated them with glitter, and then glued them onto the lids.  Harmony can use them for her Christmas "scene" and can actually pick them up and grasp them.  Nice, right?

I'll be posting a tutorial on how to make the snowflakes very soon.  :)  Have a great day and ..

Merry Christmas!

Candice S.

Glistening Pinecone Ornaments

We were using these pinecone's as fall decorations for our table centerpiece.  I was so excited when we hit December, as I planned on using these for our homemade ornaments.   

We used Mod Podge and silver glitter for a section of the pinecone to give it that snowy affect.  Harmony put on the Mod Podge and started sprinkling away!  After we finished up with the glitter and allowed the sparkly pinecones to dry, I hot glued on the ribbon ($1.00 at Walmart!).  

There is a total of six beautiful, glistening pinecone ornaments..they came out perfectly! I have another fun idea that I can't wait to try from Ms. Martha herself!  ;)  ..You'll just have to wait and see what it is. 

Happy Holiday's!!

Candice S.

Check out Rattles and Redhead's holiday section:

I've linked this project to:

Cinnamon Ornaments

I have seen wonderful recipes for making cinnamon ornaments that use applesauce, glue, and a boat load of cinnamon!  ...Lets just say.. after about 4 hours of kneading my heart out, I dumped the sticky gunk in the trash and called it a day.  

..Because I had a very eager and wanting little girl who needed to make ornaments for our tree, I decided the next best thing would be to make our salt dough recipe that we used for our fall leaves.  I added two extra ingredients to the mix: 2-4 tablespoons to applesauce and a ton of cinnamon.

Baby Brother doing his part, having fun with the plastic cookie cutters.

I added red food coloring to a portion of the dough that I sectioned off.  You flatten the dough, add a few drops of food coloring, and then quickly start folding in the dough.  Keep folding in the dough and kneading the dough until you see even color.  Add more color for more bold colored dough.

Place in oven at 150 and bake for about an hour or until desired dryness is reached.  Whalllaaaaa!  :)

Happy Holiday's!

Candice S.

Check out Rattles and Redhead's holiday section:

I've linked this project to:

The Fantastic Dr. Seuss and Fun.

Book of the Day:  Yertle the Turtle by Dr. Suess  

Activity: Observing our weather.  Harmony is learning about the different seasons and "cannot wait for fall" (as she tells me).. so we are going to use this weather recording sheet to observe and record our daily weather.  

Word of the day:  

Meteorologist: A person who studies weather and weather conditions.

Harmony has an extremely developed vocabulary so learning new words is fun for her...and us.  :)

My family has been deathly ill with a cold (maybe not to that extreme) so my posts have been non-consistent and disorderly.  I do apologize.  At the beginning of the week, when I thought I was going strong, I decided to get some projects done for Harmony's room while she was in school.  The plaque below was a purchase from the Dollar Tree.. I love the Dollar Tree.. and the beautiful print-out piece of art is from The Free Art Project @ Indie Fixx.  I just applied Mod Podge to the wooden piece, cut out the picture, and then applied it.  It came out so beautiful.  I couldn't be any more pleased, and my daughter loves it too!   

Here's another fun activity that I told you guys we would be doing.  I actually put together this puzzle on Monday, when Harmony was in preschool.  When she came home, I had it wrapped up and ready for her use.  She loved it!  I got the idea from Plaid Kids Craft, which has various fun family oriented projects that provide the level of difficulty.  Go check out their site  "after" you tell me what you think of our puzzle.  ;)

Mod Podge back of paper printout

Here's what it looks like after its been fitted and applied with Mod Podge.

I used a utility knife to carefully cut between the sticks.  *Be careful, because I did one section to quickly and it lifted the  picture*



I hope you guys have enjoyed this week.. even though I haven't had too much time outside of blowing my nose and helping my kids blow their's..

Have a great day and Happy Crafting!!

Candice S.

Repurposed Candle Holder: The New Attempted Art Piece.

Happy Saturday!  Weekends are very busy for us now and are packed with house cleaning, catching up on school and papers, and any other projects I come up with.  Harmony has started preschool so being as we have one car on the road, I bring Mark to work.  Our commute is an hour one way.  Needless to say, I am now out of the home five days week and see the car a whole lot more than paper and glue.  This weekend I planned for Harmony and I to do several different fun projects...

I have been on the biggest mission to create something that is bright and artistic to use in my bedroom.  HA!  Bright soooo isn't me.  However, I'm trying to welcome fun and unique elements into my home to liven it up so it isn't so plain and simple.

I have two white, UGLY, votice candle stands that I have never really used because ..well, they're white and they don't match anything in my house.  I took some maroon colored tissue paper and covered the largest votive candle stand that I had with Mod Podge and then several layers of the tissue paper.  I then decided to use some clock scrap booking icons that I purchased for a $1.97 at Target last week for the decorations.  I used my hot glue gun to apply them and then had decided I wasn't too happy with the tissue paper color.  I wanted to spruce it up so I went to my china cabinet where I have a tea set that was given to me from my childhood.  Why not utilize it, right?  It has been sitting around for ten years!  ...So I did.  I love the way it came out..but should have used a different colored tissue paper.  Next time I'll think that part through a little more.  :)  I'm going to use it for jewelry that I take off daily and don't want to just "throw" into my jewelry box.... Thought it would be a perfect piece right on my dresser.

Slot for random items, a ring holder, & earring holder

Love my jewelry box with matching photo of my sister and I.

Have a great weekend!

Candice S.