Quack Quack!

One of the Zebra's favourite things right now is to feed the ducks, but with this rubbish weather we aren't able to get out often... So we've decided to bring the ducks inside!

The feathers are optional, the craft works well with just the prints, but we love to glue with "tickle-tickles"!

The Zebra is so good at hand and footprints now, she barely needs any help from mummy...

On one piece of card, print two yellow feet, and then two brown hands on the other. Let them dry before glueing.

Spread a little bit of pva over the body of the duck, then stick on any coloured feathers you want!

To make the Mallard duck, cut out a head and neck shape in green, a beak in orange, and glue down a googely eye...

For the rubber duck, use yellow paint to make a big round head, and then stick on the beak and eyes 

They may not be the real thing, but they are cute enough to do till spring! 

Cold as Ice

Brrrr!!! It certainly has turned cold today, so our craft is reflecting how we feel - Frozen.

Frozen themes only need two colours - blue, and white to give different shades of blue.

With one piece of blue paper I used masking tape to make snowflake shapes. For the other piece I cut a toilet roll to make a snowflake printer.

Despite having lots of different brushes, the Zebra insisted on painting her hands and feet. She would then stamp and pat the paper to cover it white...

Once it dried, I peeled off the masking tape to give lovely blue snowflakes against a snowy white sky 

Next, the Zebra had blue paint mixed into the bowl and was given the toilet roll stamper. Things started well and she made some snow prints, but it wasn't long before the toes got in on the action and the piece became a big blue smear! 

We did have a bit of artist temper half way through as the Zebra was clearly not happy with the direction her work was going, and demanded a clean sheet of paper...

The way things are feeling here, we may have some real snow in the next couple days! 

Accidental Christmas decorations

I've had a little bucket of shells in the cupboard for a while now and wasn't sure what to do with them. Being a stones-throw from the beach means we can get more at anytime so we usually just play with them till they crack or get stepped on.

I've also have some rubbish finger paints so thought I'd throw the two together and see what happens. The paint will just make paper wet and vaguely stain it a dull colour.

The Zebra really enjoyed painting the inside and outside of the shells

She would also paint the paper and push the shells around the coloured parts 

Next we got a pot of glue to dip the shells into, before putting in a clean bowl.

Out comes the glitter! The Zebra loves getting her glue covered hands all sparkly 

Shake it all about to make sure each shell is covered, before leaving them all to dry

The glittery shells looked pretty, and the green and red was really Christmassy. I grabbed some ribbon and superglue, turning them into quick tree decorations..

While I did the finishing touches, the Zebra played with the shells and finger paints some more 

I clearly should have been paying more attention as it wasn't long until she had painted her feet and started making foot prints!! At least she had good fun

Potato prints

After finding some very old potatoes buried in my vegetable rack I decided today was a good day for trying potato print painting! 

After cutting off the shoots, the potatoes are halved, and then handles cut into the top of each one.

Next the tricky bit - cutting the bottoms into shapes. Despite starting with 8 stamps I was only able to make 4 prints! The biggest tip I can give is remember anything you cut will print with a mirror image - my Z looks great in potato, but was backwards once printed!

I wanted to go for two different types of picture, so we did:

*Paint on white paper  

*PVA glue on black paper 

While the glue was still wet we sprinkled white glitter all over, hoping for a zebra effect.

 It was lots of fun but with the backwards Z, it came out more as bright splodges

The painting was great fun and kept her occupied a good 20 minutes.

The more she stamped, the more the paint mixed and gave some really funky prints 

There was more dragging than printing but it was a good fun session with some pretty prints