Category

Kid’s activities

Egg Carton Building Blocks

Egg Carton building blocks for kids - Engineering & STEM activities - kid's arts, crafts, learning & activities with recyclables

In our last post, I told you about my daughter’s new-found love for the Pyramids. She recently saw a documentary on them & now wants to know everything about them. We went to the library & bought some books & over the weekend we made a pyramid craft. I thought it might be fun for us to stack a pyramid, so yesterday we painted some egg carton pieces & used them to build colorful pyramids.

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Exploring Shadows

When I heard the weather report for this weekend, I was overjoyed. I could not wait to get outdoors with the family.  I asked my daughter what she wanted to do & she wanted to bring her building blocks outside & play. We brought them out & began to build with them in the driveway.

Exploring shadow & light with blocks, bodies & nature painting. These are wonderful spring & summer activities that you can do with your kids while exploring shadow & light outdoors*This post contains affiliate links*

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Egg Slime

Easter is only a week away. We have been shopping & preparing for the holiday. I have a ton of plastic Easter eggs lying around waiting to get filled. I should rephrase that, I had a ton of plastic Easter eggs. My daughter  has been slowly depleting my supply & using them in her play kitchen.Make egg slime for ooey gooey pretend & sensory play for the kids

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 She pretends to crack them open & throws the empty egg shells in the trash. I had to give her a pretend trash because she was throwing them away for real. She take pretend play very seriously. She has been having a lot of fun mixing up her air eggs, but since she likes the realistic, I thought we could add a little something extra to her pretend egg scrambles. Here is what we did.

Make egg slime for ooey gooey pretend & sensory play for the kids . Play Food with slime

We made up a quick batch of slime.

Ingredients:

2.5 oz of clear school glue

2.5 oz of white school glue

1/2 cup of liquid starch

Water

For Later:

Yellow Play-doh

Extra-large plastic eggs

Directions: Pour all of the glue into a bowl. You can use all clear or all white glue, but to achieve the look I was going for I used a mixture of half & half.

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Add the liquid starch in very small increments at a time. Stir it well as you go. It will thicken quickly. Be careful not to add the starch too quickly.

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When it gets to thick to stir, you can use your hands to knead it. I used just shy of the 1/2 of liquid starch & then added spoonfuls of water at a time until I achieved the consistency I was looking for. My daughter helped.

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Use the Play-doh to form little yellow balls for the yoke. Flatten them out a little with your hand.

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Grab a handful of your slime & add a yolk to the top for a realistic looking sunny side-up egg.

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Or you can put the slime & yolk into an extra-large plastic egg for a fun egg cracking experience.

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My daughter thought that this was hilarious. “Mama, it looks like real eggs.” It turns out that just like with regular eggs that she does not like the yolk, so she pulled those out & just played with the whites. Like I said, my daughter likes to keep things realistic.

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Cardboard Box Marble Run

Kids love boxes. The larger the box, the more fun to be had. We are still in the process of getting our house unpacked after our move and have a ton of empty cardboard boxes. We have been having a lot of fun making things out of our boxes & the cardboard.
Cardboard box marble & pom pom ramp. This was so much fun & a great activity for kids - arts & craft

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 My daughter has a great building blocks marble run set.  She used to play with it all of the time. The whole family loved playing with it. Unfortunately, since our move, we have been unable to find it.

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I have seen a number of homemade marble runs made out of cardboard tubes, straws & even Legos & I thought we could try our hands at our own while we searched for our missing one.

Cardboard box marble & pom pom ramp. This was so much fun & a great activity for kids - arts & crafts from recyclables

We used a large cardboard box. We cut the flaps off of one side to leave one side wide open. We used the flaps to form our ramps.  I wanted to add different options & obstacles to the ramp so I cut a hole or multiple holes into each piece of cardboard.

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I used a glue gun to glue the cardboard pieces in place at an angle, making sure to leave space on the bottom end of each piece for the marble to be able to drop. I used plenty of glue around the edges to hold the ramp pieces in place and used cardboard tubes in a couple of areas for additional drop options.

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We tested it out a couple of times & found that our marbles fell forward a few times, so we glued a couple of extra scraps of cardboard under the bottom front to balance it out. We used the marbles, but then found that a handful of poms poms was just as fun.

Cardboard box marble & pom pom ramp. This was so much fun & a great activity for kids - arts & crafts from recyclables Cardboard box marble & pom pom ramp. This was so much fun & a great activity for kids - arts & crafts from recyclables

My little girl was so excited about her cool new toy. “This is soooo awesome, mama.”

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Styrofoam Ball Necklace

Painted Styrofoam Ball Necklace

Painted Styrofoam Ball Dress up necklace - fine motor activity and craft for kids

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Like many little girls, my daughter loves to play dress up. She loves putting on her princess dresses & trying to walk in mommy’s high heels and she loves jewelry too. Lately, she has been enjoying threading buttons & pasta and anything else she can get her hands on to make necklaces for me & her to wear. Yesterday, we added Styrofoam to that list too.

We grabbed a handful of 2″ Styrofoam balls out of our craft supplies & then one larger one. I poked a wooden skewer into each to make it easier for painting & drying.

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Hold on to the skewer & use acrylic paints to paint around each ball.

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Put the skewers in a deep container ball side up & let them stand to dry.

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Once dry, remove the skewer & use a plastic yarn needle to poke through the existing hole & string up your painted Styrofoam.

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Threading Styrofoam balls for fine motor activity & necklace craft

Tie a knot at the end to finish it off.

Just look at that smile.

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Spin, Roll & Count Gross Motor Skill Game

This gross motor skill spinner game was inspired by an idea from our clever little girl. One day after watching me do a workout video, our daughter picked up a die and rolled it and told me that she was going to do arm rolls. She rolled a 5 and did 5 arm rolls. She told me to roll too. I did and rolled a 4 and she told me to do 4 jumping jacks. This sparked a fun idea for a game that kept us both moving and laughing. This simple gross motor skills game is easy to make and fun for the whole family. Use our free printable templates or design your own.Free Printable Template for this Spin, Roll & Count Gross Motor Skill Game - paper plate spinner game for toddlers and preschoolers - arts, crafts & activities for kids

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‘If You Give A Mouse A Cookie’ Counting Game

'If You Give A Mouse A Cookie' Counting & Feeding Game - Paper Plate Craft & Activity

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I think most of us have heard the story ‘If You Give A Mouse A Cookie’. If you have not, it is a tale of a mouse and a series of events that occurs as a result of him getting a cookie. It is a fun book to read & my daughter just loves it.

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We often joke with our daughter & say “If you give a Mai A Cookie”. This joke came up this week. “How about you give Mai 1, 2, 3 , 4 cookies, mama?” Nice try! She did not get 4 cookies, but she did give me an idea for a fun craft & counting activity.

What you will need:

Paper Plates

Construction Paper

Paint

Glue

Markers

Directions:

Sketch & cut a mouth hole out of a paper plate.

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Paint your paper plate in brown & let dry.

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Cut ears & a nose out of construction paper & glue onto the plate.

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Draw in the eyes, mouth & whiskers with marker.

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Glue around the sides & top of the back of the plate & glue to another paper plate. Leave the bottom unglued so that there is an opening at the bottom.

Cut 10 circles out of light brown construction paper small enough to fit into the slot on the mouse’s mouth.

Draw chocolate chips on them.

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Cut 10 squares of paper & number them from 1 – 10. Mai did such a great job writing out her number cards.

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Now you are ready to play your game.

'If You Give A Mouse A Cookie' Counting game, activity & craft Paper Plate craft

Mix up your number cards & have your child draw one. Have them feed the mouse that number of cookies. Another option is to make the cookies with a certain number of chocolate chips & feed them the cookie with the correct number of chips. Let your child decide which they prefer.

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Feed your hungry mouse. My daughter wanted to feed both mice. She counted out the cookies for both mice & fed them both full.

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When you have used up all your cookies. Just shake them out of the opening that you left at bottom.

I had a hard time pulling my daughter away from this. She was having a lot of fun with it. She gave both mice their cookies over & over again. And of course when you a give a mouse a cookie, don’t forget, he is going to want a glass of milk to go with it.

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Like ‘If You Give A Mouse A Cookie’?, try the whole series of books.

Paper Plate Hair Cutting Activity

Paper Plate hair cutting activity & craft - this activity is a great fine motor skill activity. My daughter had so much fun with this.

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I cut my daughter’s hair. If you have ever tried to cut a 3 year old’s hair, you should know that it is not an easy feat. I had to pretend that we were playing hairdresser in order to get her to stay still. While I was cutting, she kept asking if she could have the scissors and cut her own hair. When I was done, she asked if she could be the hairdresser now & cut mine. I had to say no to both, but it did give me an idea.

We have been working on using safety scissors lately.  She likes to practice cutting & is still trying to find her comfort level in holding them. I thought that we could make a hair cutting activity for her.

All you will need is:

A paper plate

Construction paper

Glue

Markers

Googly eyes

Safety scissors – My daughter actually wanted to use scrapbook scissors for this activity. (Use caution & supervise your children when working with scissors.)

Directions:

Cut strips of paper in the color of your choice to form the hair. We made our hair wavy, so we cut wavy strips.

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Glue a piece of construction paper of the same color around the back of the paper plate & trim any excess that hangs over the plate. Glue a flesh-toned piece of paper to the front & trim the excess as well. Add ears. Glue the strips of paper to the back to form the hair in the back.

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Glue googly eyes onto the front & draw in the nose and mouth. Glue on a couple of strands of hair to the front & add long bangs for them to trim as well.

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I gave Mai a few different pairs of scrapbook scissors & let her cut away. She is still trying to figure out the best way to hold her scissors, so I demonstrated on a separate piece of paper.

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She had a lot of fun with this one & even told me that she has the most fun doing projects with me. Awwww. She is getting better each time with her scissors. Practice does make perfect after all.

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Foam Shape Magnets For Imagination Play

DIY foam shape magnets. These are great for creative and imagination play. Easy to make - kid's arts, crafts and activities.

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We like to work with shapes a lot in our home.  My daughter loves creating with shapes & I love watching her. Her imagination is flourishing & it is an amazing thing to see. We use these shapes to make abstract art, holiday crafts & we even use them for imagination play in the bath. Last night, my daughter came across a photo of shape magnets for kids in one of her kid’s magazines.. Her eyes automatically lit up. “Mama, I want these.” My eyes lit up too when I realized that I could make them myself at home.

Foam Shape Magnets

What you will need:

Different colored foam sheets

Magnet strips

Glue gun

Directions:

Cut several different shapes in different sizes out of the foam. I use foam a lot for crafts, so I luckily had a big bag of scraps left over.

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Cut several pieces of magnets and set them aside.

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Use a glue gun to glue the magnet pieces to the back of the foam pieces & let the glue dry.

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Put your shapes on the refrigerator & let your child go.

IMG_8832 Foam Shape Magnets for imagination play

This was a fantastic activity for her. She was so excited & happy as she created pictures out of her shapes. She showed me each one & told me the story about each creation.

This one was a milkshake with a straw.

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She worked on her tippy toes to form this one, which was a girl flying a kite at night.

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This one was me holding an ice cream cone.

 

This kept her happy & entertained up until bedtime.

The magnets were pretty simple to make, but you can always purchase a set of shape magnets too. They would make a great gift for an imaginative toddler in your life.

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DIY foam shape magnets. These are great for creative and imagination play. Easy to make - kid's arts, crafts and activities.