paint cut paste

this post is truly for the birds… it’s a way to help our little winged friends pimp their nests for spring, while also using up the scraps you have cluttering up that art bin.

think of these as ornaments for springtime… to be hung outside on the trees in your yard so that birds can peck into them, between the wires, to retrieve lovely adornments for the nests they’re building. this is also a great wintertime project, especially if you are in a snowy area, as it is harder for birds to find scraps and things with which to create nests in such conditions. over the winter, i saw a nest kit made in what looked like a tiny crab pot cage in a gift shop. these can be made inside of lots of things – think mesh bags from the grocery store, little crafty bird cages, etc. i opted to come up with my own homemade version.

the first part is a grown-up (or older child) task: take some wire (i recommend 20 gauge or thicker) and wrap it around one of your child’s balls (ours was tennis ball size, but you can use any sized ball you wish.) i used one of novi’s squishy water balls so that i could mush it to slip it out easily when i was finished wrapping.

after you’ve wrapped it sufficiently, bring the ends of the wire to meet at the top, for a loop, and twist around it with some small pliers. then gently pull the ball out of a larger opening. once you do that, you may need to manipulate your wire back into a ball shape with your hands. you can get creative with sizes and shapes. i strung a couple of wooden beads into ours for fun.

then grab your little one and go hunting through your art cabinet/closet/drawer/bin for scraps of felts, fabrics, ribbons, raffia, moss, feathers, or anything that seems soft and strong enough to hold up to rain. think earth-friendsly and biodegradable. (no plastics, please!)

our scrappy mess

if scraps are large, cut them into little strips.

you and your child can have fun stuffing the wire ball full of these scraps. we enjoyed thinking of color schemes or themes for each one.

now just hang your little orb on a tree outside and see if it draws any feathered friends to it. days or weeks later, it can be fun to take your child out on a nest quest in your yard (or neighborhood) to find little birdie homes that include your groovy treasures. one fun part is that once the birds have emptied your orbs, you can refill them!

these make great gifts for spring birthdays, easter, earth day, mother’s day, and father’s day! just be sure to include a note with it so the recipient knows just what to do with it and doesn’t think you haven’t lost your mind by sending them a ball of art scraps.

ah, the luck of the irish! my daughter is 1/8th irish, as my husband is 1/4th… (no irish in me, but i did enjoy a brief trek through ireland back in college.) i figured that we should celebrate st. patrick’s day with some sort of craft, in honor of novi’s bloodline…

who couldn’t use more luck? thus, blarney stones! in ireland, the famous blarney stone resides at the top of blarney castle in the southwest part of the country, where tourists climb winding stairs just to kiss the stone. this is said to give them “blarney” which means luck, but more specifically eloquence. (um, the gift to gab isn’t really something my daughter needs more luck with!) in the craft world, it seems that blarney stones are traditionally rocks painted green, with little faces on them (kissing faces usually) or they could have shamrocks on them, instead.

we figured it’d be fun to make our own blarney stones for our seasonal altar at home. we collected a few smooth stones with a flat bottom from our backyard flowerbed and washed them. then we gathered up our crafty materials and green acrylic paint (well, we mixed our dark green with some yellow to make more of a kelly green color.)

we painted each of them (except one*) green and let them dry. to speed that along, i used a hairdryer on low heat.

after they were dry, we glued on googly eyes, felt mouths, embroidery floss hair, and even a hat made of felt and a flower sequins adornment.

after making three blarneys to kiss all month long, novi had enough, so i painted a shamrock onto the fourth stone with glitter glue (which might make a cute good luck charm to give to someone someday?)

* novi was adamant about “keeping the last stone natural!!!” so we did, and she gave it to her “good luck care bear” as his st. patrick’s day gift.

this is an easy and seasonal variation on pet rocks…  it can be fun any time of year to make a face on a rock, but if you want the luck of the irish on your side, be sure to kiss these green cuties every day!

here’s another one of those art activities that starts out with the best intentions, and then falls sort of flat in the end. though, it is my aim to share all of our art-experiements with you, dear readers, so that maybe you can try it with better luck, perhaps, and learn from our mistakes.

my sweet husband brought home two dozen beautiful red roses a while back. we’re not big fans of purchasing cut flowers over here (lovely as they are, they are kind of a waste of money and our cats usually just eat them, knock over the vase, and later vomit flower-parts up onto the rug.) regardless, the roses were romantic, and quite pretty for that temporary while. and husband assures me they were on sale. hopefully this blog comes at just about the time when your valentine flowers are dunzo and can begin their second life. when my roses’ vibrant petals started dropping, i thought there must be something we could do with them.

a zillion things came to mind from rosewater to rose baths (but who am i kidding? i hardly soak in a bath anymore and who knows if there are pesticides on these) to potpourri (but that just collects dust at grandmothers’ houses, right? gross.) so i googled a bit, and found out about rose beads. alright, cool and useful recycling, i thought. i’m a long-time beader… and maybe novi will enjoy this. i figured i could make a meaningful, very personal mala from these… so novi happily helped me to pick off the wilted petals.

then i followed the instructions for rose beads that i found on learn to know, and ground up my limp (but not dried) petals in our food processor until they were couscous-like.

the next step was to simmer the petals in just enough water to cover them, using a cast iron pot. i don’t have a cast iron pot, so i just used a regular one. the thing i read promised that our house would smell delightful. WRONG! it started to stink. i am not sure why, but it kinda grossed us all out.

after a few sessions of boiling, we squeezed out as much water as we could (through a screen strainer) and let the pulp dry by keeping it out for a couple of days. after it was a tacky consistency, we were able to pinch off pieces of it to roll into little balls. if it’s still really wet at this stage, the balls fall apart easily, so i’ll forewarn you that your little friends with tiny fingers can get easily frustrated by this. make sure it’s kind of like paste before you begin this step with a kiddo-helper. (i regret not taking a lot of photos of this as we did it, but i didn’t really know if it would be blog-worthy at the time. honestly, i still don’t know that it is, but i do know that it was a lot of effort expended… read on…)

so we placed our rolled rose petal balls (which smelled a bit putrid, i have to admit) onto a piece of cardboard and let them dry out in the garage for days.

the thing is, i was supposed to wait until they were mostly, but not totally dry, and stick a pin or a stiff wire through them to make holes in each bead (to string it!) but i neglected to do this, as i forgot they were out there. weeks turned into months. uh oh. now we are left with some hole-less, spheres of dried rose petals… i imagine i could put sturdy beading wire through them and still string them as a mala strand or even a mala bracelet… but i may just chalk this one up to an art-gone-wrong activity. somewhat due to the stench (why?! maybe they had pesticides on them?? they were grocery store sale roses afterall…) and mostly due to my negligence in attending to them at the proper stage for piercing.

we’re open to suggestions… what should we do with these little floral orbs now?