foam Archives – The Pinterested Parent

Tag

foam

Sat
24 ^th

Foam Tub Clings

Posted by Pinparent — 8 Comments

If you have a toddler or a small child, you know the importance of routines. We have had the same bedtime routine with our daughter for the majority of her young life. Somewhere around 7:30 she brushes her teeth, takes a bath & gets in her jammies. We read some books, rock & then tuck her in for bed. As she has gotten older she has made some subtle adjustments to her routine.

*This post contains affiliate links*

In lieu of books, she now prefers to be read Highlights magazines, lots of them. At the end of every magazine there are usually games, activities & recipes for the kids to do. In a recent edition, I came across a great idea.

Did you know that foam will stick to the side of a tub when it is wet? I did not either. We work with foam sheets for crafting all the time, so I had plenty of it to experiment with. I cut out different colored shapes & showed my daughter how to dip it in the water & stick it to the side of the tub. She let her imagination go from there. She sent me out of the bathroom a few times to cut more foam. She had special requests for certain shapes so that she could finish her masterpieces.

Mai made a sideways & colorful snowman, a man in a hat & scarf and just a square.

Here she created a princess castle & a Minnie Mouse.

She had so much fun with the shapes that I could not get her out of the tub. I had a pruny footed toddler at bedtime, but she sure did have fun.
<br /> <br />

Wed
25 ^th

Surviving My First 5K

Posted by Pinparent — 10 Comments

The day finally came. It was only a matter of time that I would finally break down and run my first race. With a marathon runner for a husband it was inevitable. Even my daughter has already completed her first race. Should I be embarrassed that my two year old received her first race medal before me? I started training a couple of months ago. I did not realize just how bad of shape I was in. My first couple of weeks started off great, but then work, baby & scheduling conflicts made it virtually impossible to get to the gym or run outside. I was very worried about how ill prepared I was. I became even more worried when I saw that the course was all uphill. Luckily, my first 5K was an obstacle course race. With 16 foamy & muddy obstacles there were many breaks in the uphill running (and by running, I mean mostly walking). The obstacles consisted of climbing walls, a giant foam slip & slide, mud crawls & a massive bouncy slide as the finale. Between all the huffs & puffs, some muddy water in the mouth & foam in the eyes, I had the time of my life. I am disappointed in myself for not training harder for it, but I did accomplish what I set out to do, I finished my first race & had a great time doing it. It was a nice break for us mommies. I am ready for round 2. Bring on the next race & this time I will train harder.

Sun
18 ^th

Foam Play Food

Posted by Pinparent — 9 Comments

Like many children my daughter’s age, she loves being mommy’s little helper. This past week she has been very eager to help me in the kitchen. I let her measure out ingredients and stir. She plays with the food scraps & measuring spoons & loves every minute of it.
One of her favorite things to do is to make “soup”. She loves pouring liquid from container to container & she loves throwing things in the liquid as well. She has come up with some interesting combinations in some interesting places. Do not ever leave my daughter alone with her milk or juice. You never know where you might find it later.

After helping me make dinner tonight, she wanted to help with the dishes too. There were a lot of sharp items that needed washing, I needed her to stay occupied elsewhere. I gave her a few different sizes of plastic bowls, some measuring cups & spoons and some water to play with.

As usual she told me she was making soup. She started grabbing at random objects on our island to throw in her bowls. Remember those capsules that grew into little foam creatures when they got wet? She grabbed a few of those & threw them in. They turned into different fish. “I make a fish soup, Mama. I mixing it.” This gave me an idea. I grabbed a few sheets of foam from our craft bin & cut out some little foam fish for her to add to her fish soup. This was fun. She was chasing the little fish with the tablespoon and fishing them out one by one.

From there, Mai asked for tomatoes and potatoes. We ended up quickly making up a whole smorgasbord of foam food to throw in her soup; meatballs, spaghetti, broccoli, onion, etc. This added a whole new dimension to her water play. It was a quick and easy project that my daughter loved.

This kept her occupied long enough that I actually got to do something I have not done in quite a while…clean my house. With Mai deeply immersed in cooking her foam food soup, I was able to clean up after dinner and straighten up our pit of a living room a little bit. Mommy of course had to taste test it. “Mama, eat it.” Mmmmm…foam soup is delicious. Good job cooking, my sweet girl.

Thank you as always for stopping by. Please follow us on Facebook as well.

Thu
24 ^th

Paper Towel Roll Crafting

Posted by Pinparent — 12 Comments

For the past few months now I have been hoarding away empty paper towel rolls. I had built up quite the collection and the sight of the rolls piled up on top of my kitchen cabinet was starting to give me hives. It was finally time to put them to some use. Mai and I have been on a craft frenzy this week. We made a mess, had a few tantrums & a few laughs and smiles too. Each of these crafts that we made uses one of our paper towel tube.

Paper Mache Maracas

What you will need:

Plastic Easter eggs (1 for each maraca made)

An empty paper towel roll cut in half or two toilet paper rolls

Uncooked chickpeas or dried beans

Newspaper

Glue

Water

Masking tape

Paint

Directions:

Fill each Easter egg with chickpeas or beans

Use one or two full pages of newspaper & wrap in around the chickpea filled Easter egg. Form it into a ball shape.

Tape the edges in place to hold the shape tightly.

Enlist the help of your favorite little crafter to tear up strips of newspaper for you.

In a bowl, mix 3/4 glue and 1/4 water to form your paper mache adhesive.

Dip a strip of the paper into your glue mixture.

Wrap your strip of paper around your ball shape smoothing it out carefully as you work it around.

After you receive a desired shape, allow it to dry & then place your ball on top of the paper towel tube halve.

Adhere the ball to the tube using masking tape & then cover the tape with more newspaper strips.

Continue to wrap your project with the paper strips and glue until you reach the desired shape. Make sure that all areas are smooth and that edges are not sticking up. Let it dry.

Paint the handles of your maracas first in the color of your choice and allow to dry.

Once dry, continue to paint the rest. You may now use the handle to hold on to while you paint.

Make beautiful music.

Mai thought these were rattles. As she was shaking them, she kept saying “Ooooooh, I’m a baby..so cute.”

Paper Towel Kaleidoscope

What you will need:

An empty paper towel roll

Colored beads

Thin plastic (I used old plastic packaging)

Heavy duty aluminum foil

Glue gun

Craft paper

Ribbon

Directions:

Cut out two pieces of plastic small enough to fit snuggly inside of the paper towel tube.

As deep in the tube as you can, use your glue gun and squeeze out a line of glue rotating until it meets the starting end.

Give it a few seconds to cool slightly and then press your plastic disk into the glue.

Pour the beads on top of the disk, leaving enough room for the beads to move around. Add hot glue to the top edge of tube over the beads and place the other disk in place.

Fold a piece of tin foil into a triangle. Push your triangle into the open end of the tube. Trim the end as needed. Make sure to reform the shape. It will work best if the triangle has crisp, hard edges.

Cut out another disk using cardboard or thick scrapbook paper. Poke a hole through the middle of it & glue it to the tin foil end.

I wrapped my kaleidoscope in craft paper, but you can decorate however you like, paint, crayon, beads, ribbon.

Not quite like the real thing, but it still is fun to play with.

Butterfly Craft

What you will need:

An empty paper towel tube

Foam sheets

Scrap book paper

Pipe cleaners

Craft pom poms

Glue gun

Elmer’s Glue

Directions:

This was a pretty simple one. You could also do this on a smaller scale with a toilet paper roll.

Cut out foam pieces in the shape of the wings.

Using different colored scrap strips, wrap around the tube and glue using the hot glue gun.

Run the glue gun along the edge of the wing where they should meet with the paper towel tube.

Pour some glue into a paper bowl and let your munchkin dip the pom poms in and glue to the butterfly.

Mai decides it is way more fun to stuff the pom poms in the tube than to decorate with them.

Glue one large pom pom to the top for your head & use pipe cleaners to make antennas. Let dry and your craft is done.