Blown Eggs

This is a great Easter activity (sorry for the late post about it), but it could be fun really anytime you are ready for a fun art project.

Materials:
Rechenka's Eggs by Patricia Polocco (optional)
eggs (as many as you want)
small knife or other sharp implement
decorating supplies (such as stickers, markers, paints, glitter glue, etc...)
string or pipe cleaner

Directions:

Read Rachenka's Eggs by Patricia Polocco to start out.

Take an egg and hold it firmly between your fingers. Use a sharp knife to puncture a tiny hole in the top of the egg. Turn the egg over and make a small hole in the bottom. Blow the contents of the egg into a bowl and you can cook these up like scrambled eggs or use them for a recipe. Repeat with as many eggs as you want.

When you've blow all the egg out of the shells take the eggs to the sink and rinse them out thoroughly. Leave them on a paper towel to dry/drain.

Have your little one carefully decorate the eggs any way he/she wants. My little girl liked painting her eggs the best. But she also had fun with stickers and makers and glitter glue. With the eggs that are decorated with markers and glitter you'll need to hang them up to dry. So poke a piece of pipe cleaner into the egg's hole and hang them up. You can also do this with string.

That's it! SOOOOO fun.

Variations: you can glue google eyes onto your egg and then decorate a face with markers. You can add strings or ribbons to make hair and call it an "egg baby."

Furry Friends

For some reason spring makes me think of baby animals, so I had to do a baby animal craft with my toddler.

To make one yourself all you need is a glue stick, some cotton balls and a clip art image of an animal of your choice. My 2 year old chose the image of the bunny we used all by herself :), but some other ideas could be a sheep or lamb, baby chick, etc.



Then you just glue cotton balls on the image wherever you want to make it fuzzy. You can even get out some crayons or markers after and color away. Super easy and fun!

Pinecone Bird Feeders

Materials needed:

Pine cones(or any kind that you can find)
Yarn
Bird seed
Peanut butter
2 Bowls
Rubber spatula
Newspaper(or any paper)

Look around your yard(or in my case, my neighborhood) and pick up some pine cones of any sort.

Take the pine cones home and cut long pieces of yarn to tie around the top of the pine cone.

Then scoop some peanut butter into a bowl and put it in the microwave for 15-20 seconds, or just until soft enough to be spreadable. Then spread it onto the pine cones.

Pour some bird seed into a separate bowl and dip the pine cone into the bird seed. Then place them on newspaper until you're all finished. Then go find a tree to hang them in and watch the little birdies eat the delicious food you have made for them!! :)

Sink or Float?

Materials needed:

A big bowl
Small toys or objects. (choose some that you know will sink and some that will float)

Simply fill the bowl full of water and let your child place the items in the bowl. Talk about whether the objects are sinking or floating and explain what that means. Let your child guess whether the next object will sink or float. If they are old enough you could even start talking about density.

This is a great activity for many ages, because you can adapt the information given to your child's age level. Put the bowl in a the middle of your kitchen floor on a towel, and don't worry so much about spills. What child doesn't love to play in water?

(Please excuse my son's clothing choice... He has his own ideas about his wardrobe these days.)

Spoon People

Materials:

Wooden spoons
Google eyes
Yarn
Buttons
Glitter glue
Hot glue gun

Directions:

Have your little one lay out the parts of the spoon person's face on the spoon how he/she wants. Let the child choose the color of button nose and other things. When the pieces are in place, YOU glue them on with hot glue. Wind up a bit of yarn and tie it together for hair and glue it on as well. Then, take some glitter glue and draw a mouth. When the glitter glue dries you are all done! Have a puppet show or just play with them.



*Tips - this activity was super cheap. I bought a set of spoons at Wal-Mart that only cost me $1, then I got some google eyes (again $1) and some buttons ($1) I already had yarn (hence they all have white hair, but I have so much white yarn I didn't want to buy different colors) and glitter glue. You can also use what you have - instead of buttons use puff balls if you have them.

You can also leave the mouth off if you don't have glitter glue - it looks cute either way.

Find That Number!

Supplies:


11 small slips of paper with numbers 0-10 written on them
3 plastic or paper cups
10 beads, marbles, raisins, buttons (really, anything)

How to play:
Have your child cover his/her eyes. Place one of the pieces of paper under one of the three cups (make sure the papers are small enough so that the cup can cover them). Then have your child guess which cup has the paper. When they find the paper have them identify what the number is. Then have your child count out the same number of beads as the number on the paper. Repeat until all numbers have been hidden, identified, and counted.

Modifications:
Cut out shapes on the slips of papers and then have your child identify the shape and name how many sides/corners it has.

Color on the sheets of paper and have your child identify the color and then find 3 objects in the house that are the same color.

Write letters on the papers and have your child identify the letter, give it's sound, and think of a word that starts with that letter.

Write words on the papers and have your child read the words.

Really - you can use this game for any learning activity!

Stuffed Animal Safari

Materials:

~2 toilet paper rolls or one paper towel roll cut in half

~construction paper

~stapler & scissors

~all the stuffed animals you can find :)



Directions:

1. Color the construction paper if desired.



2. Staple the cardboard rolls together, wrap the construction paper around and cut to size, then staple the paper to the rolls.



3. Hide the stuffed animals around your house, and going searching for them with your new binoculars.



Happy hunting!