Colourful skull and monster cookies

I've just written up a little Halloween project over at Alpha Mom about using cookie dough as playdough and baking it into nomable 3D monster and skull cookie sculptures. We had a lot of fun doing this one and as you can probably tell, it's not something that you have to limit to Halloween. You can make any cookie your imagination can invent with this technique. I'm quite tempted to get a bunch more dough made and make a cookie solar system or a cookie self portraits. Endless possibilities and when you've got more than one kid and only one rolling pin and hardly any cookie cutters, this is a great alternative to conventional cookie baking! so pop over to Alpha Mom to read more and see some more photos too.

We have had fun with cookie dough and food colouring in the past here as well, making giant cookies and pizza cookie here, plus candy cane cookies last year and cookies that you could lace with too.

Hope you've all got your Halloween costumes ready. We haven't! Carys only told me a couple of days ago that she wants to be Miss Frizzle from The Magic School Bus series of books, which I think is a totally awesome choice, but does mean that I need to do some sewing over the next week. At least the princess dress that Ffion wants to wear just needs the length altering. Any ideas for a really easy baby costume for Delyth? I thought maybe I could make her a lizard costume, so she could be either Liz to Carys's Miss Frizzle, or Pascal to Ffion's Rapunzel, but that seems like a lot of work right now!

Halloween and other people's projects

I want to post about the birthday gift that we (me and Paul) made for Carys this year, but it's going to have to wait because it ain't done yet! Arg, bit off more than I could chew in the time available, but she's a cracking kid and totally understands that it's nearly ready and I just want it to not be a rushed mess because with any luck this gift will be something that lasts for many years. I'll be excited to show you some pics when it is done though.

She had a few little gifts actually on the day though, so she was happy. One that really went down well was the "birthday coupons", which was a totally last minute thing scribbled on some index cards at almost midnight before her birthday. She's actually using the ice-cream for breakfast one tomorrow morning, at least that's what she said before bed anyway. Have any of you tried this? I think we're going to do it for every birthday from now on (maybe even for me and Paul!)

This post is mainly to give kudos to some people that have tried out some of the things on Filth Wizardry and made their own versions and also to give a bit of a round up of anything Halloween themed or fall themed from the archives for any of you that are new here and won't have seen them because they are burried in the depths of my badly tagged posts.

I got into the habit last year of doing round ups every now and again to share other people's versions of our projects, but I let that slip and I'd like to start doing those round ups again. Unfortunately, even if people did email me about their takes on our crafts over that period of time, I'm not going to be able to find them easily in my chaotic inbox, so this little round up is just a few things that have been brought to my attention over the last week or so. In the future I'll try to be a bit better about putting emails in the right places and not getting burried under them.

• Kami from Get Your Mess On (also of Austin Tinkering School awesomeness) posted about the hot glue and wooden stick marble and ping pong ball fun they had after reading our tribute to Scott Weaver post. Love that they got some marble run action going with theirs, because we all got sidetracked into the sculpture side of it and didn't get very far with the plans to make it a dynamic sculpture.
• Eden Folwell and her daughter did some snail painting together. Boy is that a blast from the past for us! Our 2008 snail painting is still up in the kitchen. I am rather sentimental about certain pieces of art that we've made together and that was a very fun afternoon we had making that one!
• Speaking of art that I am sentimental about, Meri cherry over at her blog by the same awesome name posted about the leaf rubbing mural her class made after seeing our one from 2009. This is another thing that we still have up on our wall years later because I love it so much. Seeing the one that Meri's kids made gave me the grins and a bucket full of nostalgia too.

If you have had a go at one of the projects/experiments/crafts/stunts posted on Filth Wizardry then let me know and I'll add your link to a round up in the future :)

Possibly useful Halloween and Fall posts.

With Halloween around the corner, here are a few old posts that might come in handy for last minute costume making or decorating or just fall themed makings...

 

• Halloween pancakes from 2009. This was before Jim from Jim's Pancakes went and put my efforts to shame! Have you seen, he's doing Star Wars pancakes now! Tardis Pancake dude! Make a Tardis pancake!
• Jack-o-lantern apple printing, Frankenstein hand prints and halloween stencils from 2009.
• Toilet roll bat decorations from 2009.
• Milk jug trick or treat pumpkin pots from 2008.
• Jack-o-lantern pinata from 2009.
• Pumpkin carving daftness from 2009.

As far as costume stuff goes, here are a few posts that might help with last minute cheap ideas...

• If you've got a little girl and two little boys, I would love to see someone do Amy Pond, The Doctor and Rory as The Last Centurion. Yes, if the remote controlled Dalek from recycling didn't give it away, I am a bit of a Dr Who fan. Here's our Roman centurion costume from cardboard and crepe paper that you could whip up pretty fast.
• Easy peasy lemon squeezy mermaid tail from some old sweat pants and a flouncy skirt at Goodwill.
• Headband Star Wars masks for trick or treating. With bonus weird photo of our dessicated 2009 Christmas tree done up for Halloween.
• Balloon torch light sabers for last minute Jedi trick or treating.
• The funny looking but beloved old milk jug storm trooper helmet. Also milk jug batman masks.
• Insect antennae for bug costumes. Made from felt and electrical ties.
• Superhero fleece poncho capes for if it's very cold where you are trick or treating.
• Newspaper swords for pirates, muskateers and I dunno, kid's that want to be olympic fencers?
• Seriously last minute panick stricken costume possibilities also include Origami bunny ears and the gift bag robot costume  (Aw, my girls look so little! How time flies) and all manner of weird stuff out of aluminium foil :)

One kid has decided she wants to be rapunzel for Halloween, no doubt along with all the other girls in her class, but she'll be the only one with a Vic and Bob style homemade foam frying pan if I have my way :) The other one hasn't expressed her preference yet and I have no idea what to put the littlest one in either, but we'll figure something out closer to the time.

We're off to have some fun at the East Bay Mini Maker Faire tomorrow. Thought I'd mention it in case any local folk don't know that it's going on and might like to take part.

Back on Thursday with a new Halloween project for you!

Invention kit party bags

Well, I left this until the very last moment! I'm not sure if this is the norm all across America or if it's done anywhere else in the world either, but here locally in the elementary schools, kids bring in treat bags for their friends when it's their own birthday. Carys is about to turn seven and she wanted to make each of her classmates an "invention kit". She's really into making things, totally random things, mind bogglingly weird things with all the bits and pieces of craft supplies and recycling that we have in our home, so it seemed like a natural sort of gift to come from her.

My first thought was "How do I make this not look like a bag of bits and bobs of random rubbish?" I personally loved the idea of an invention kit vs the usual plastic party bag misc, but I didn't want her friends to think "Why are you giving me paperclips and string you weirdo?", so I figured a bit of creative marketing might do the trick.

The other reason I liked the idea was that we could put it together quite cheaply for a class of 24 kids. I had quite a lot of stuff around already that we could use in the kits, so it only took $4 spent in Daiso for the bags and candy, plus another $10 in the Dollar Tree for extra bits.

In the bags are:

• Paper (origami sheets and strips)
• Craft foam
• card (coloured index card)
• Goggly eyes
• Rubber bands
• A balloon
• Metalic tie tags
• Paper clips
• Straws
• Glitter glue
• A Magnet
• Popsicle sticks
• Crayons
• Double sided sticky foam pads
• Pom poms
• Adhesive Jewels
• String
• A mini flourescent cable tie
• Foam stickers
• Pipe cleaners
• Modeling clay
• 2 different candies

Quite a lot fits in the little bag! I won't lie, it took a while to divide up all the bits into the 24 bags and make the paper topper for the kit, but it was done in a couple of hours, so not all that bad really.

I put together the label for the top of the bag to personalise the gift and to make it look a bit like a proper craft kit so the kids are more enthused with the notion of an open ended, inventing project. They are just printed on regular printer paper, two to a sheet, folded over and then stapled onto the top of the bag. This is the back of the label that lists the contents.

I actually had enough supplies to make 30 bags, which is great because we have some freinds coming over for Pizza and a movie on her actual birthday, which is Saturday, so they can have a kit each too.

We've been planning and making her birthday present again this year. You might remember the Falcon dollhouse and Star Wars peg dolls from last year, well this year we've attempted something a bit bigger and significantly more ambitious, so with a three month old also in the picture, it'll be interesting to see if we can get it finished in time. By the way, the aforementioned three month old just keeps getting more and more delicious every day and looks so much like her biggest sister, the birthday girl did at that age!

The photo on the left was taken almost seven years ago! Seven! Brain cannot compute!

DIY cloth pirate maps

Yarrrr! Talk like a pirate day be just around the corner Mateys!

September 19th to be exact. We've been making our own pirate treasure hunting maps over at Alpha Mom this year. It's a very simple project, using things you likely have around the house anyway. These maps will stand the test of time too, because they are cloth and so can't be ripped easily and can also be laundered, providing a keepsake of your child's artwork as well as a nifty play thing.

So me hearties, click over to Alpha Mom to see my post there on how we made these.

Also, if you are new around these parts, you might want to check out last year's Talk Like A Pirate Day craft that I did over there, making rolled newspaper pirate swords and pirate girl bandana skirts for all your feminine swashbuckling needs :)

The technique used to make these maps is one that we've used in the past to make skirts for the kids out of their own artwork, but as you can see, it's such a flexible and easy way to get designs onto cloth, kids can use it to create pretty much anything their hearts desire.

Ooooh, you could even make a pirate map skirt or shorts ;)

"Make Stuff Together" Giveaway winner.

Aaaaaand the winner of the copy of "Make Stuff Together" that isn't covered in jammy fingerprints iiiiiiiis...

Carrie, who was chosen by random.org as the sixth commenter on the thread, and said:
"What an interesting book! It sounds right up my alley."

So Carrie, if you send me the address of your alley I shall send your copy of this lovely book right up it as soon as I can get to the post office :)

You can email me at filthwizardry at gmail dot com.

Thank you to all of you that commented. It's always nice to be able to see who some of my readers are, because I know a lot of you will have blogs of your own and it's nice to be able to click through and check them out. I've got more time to do that sort of thing now that I have to sit down to breastfeed several times a day :) Now I just need to get better at one handed typing, so that I can reply to my emails at a better pace!

For those of you that didn't win the draw but are still interested in purchasing a copy of Bernadette and Kathie's book, here's the link to it's page on Amazon (not an affiliate thing) and I'll have another craft project for you on here tomorrow :)

"Make Stuff Together" Book Giveaway

Here we are! That illusive book review that has taken me so long to write up.

I was approached by Bernadette Noll and Kathie Sever, the authors of “Make Something Together” a few months ago, before their book was released. They asked if I would like to be part of their book blog tour and although I have never said yes to a giveaway on Filth Wizardry before, and I was just about to give birth, I wanted to say yes to this particular book. The way they described it to me, it sounded quite lovely and totally in keeping with the vibe of our home, so I wanted to be involved in helping to promote it in some way.

Now that things have reached some sort of rhythm in the newborn department and I’ve had a chance to really sit down and read through the book and see how the projects and philosophy are applicable to our own family, I’m ready and able to write about it and of course offer a copy of the book to one lucky commenter on this post.

Bernadette and Kathie, the authors of this book, have had a lot of experience with collaborative crafting, especially with children. Bernadette co-founded Slow Family Living and Kathie is the creator of Ramonsterwear. Together they have formed Future Craft Collective to find ways that families can be creative together in a sustainable fashion. At the start of the book, before you get to the detail of the individual projects, they take the time to share their experiences and talk about the “why” and “what to expect” aspects of creating with your family. This part of the book, as well as being very well written is also extremely encouraging to those that are nervous about setting the right environment for a pleasant crafting experience when children are involved.

I think the thing that I like most about this book is that it is relevant to a large range of ages and abilities. Out of the 24 projects, some are simple projects that younger children can use as an initiation into sewing and to gain confidence quickly, but there are also more complicated projects that preteens will be able to throw themselves into. As much as I can see me and my five and six year old making some of these things together, I can equally imagine that the book is still going to be in use when my older girls are ten and eleven and they have their little five year old sister to help join in with the making too.

The other thing that stood out to me when I read through this book was that the projects are all real keepers. You're upcycling, reusing and recycling materials, but in a way that creates family items that will really become part of the home atmosphere and traditions. Most of the upcycling that I do with the kids when we craft is making things that are fun and yes they use recycled materials most of the time, but they aren't things that I can see us having and still using say ten years from now. In contrast to our usual fun with recycling, I'm excited to make some items from this book, such as the table runner and napkins or the family flags, that can be more permanent creative fixtures in our family's home for years to come.

I've wanted to sit down at the sewing machine with my older girls, who are five and six years old for some time now, but deciding on what we should try and how to go about it has delayed me taking the plunge. I think it's this book that's going to ease us into the process of sewing together and I'm looking forward to it!

If you'd like a chance to win your own copy of "Making Stuff Together" then just leave a comment on this post and I'll announce a winner on Wednesday next week.

Disclosure: Bernadette and Kathie gave me a copy of this book for myself as well as one to give away on Filth Wizardry, but all the views I have expressed above are my own and this also means that the book the winner gets won't have little jammy fingerprints all over it from my children ;)

Stamping with Lego and craft foam

Hello! Long time no blog! Delyth is six weeks old now and we've been enjoying both the scrummy new baby and the summer vacation. I have got plenty that I want to get up on Filth Wizardry in the next month, even a book giveaway, which I've never done before. It's a cracking book, so that'll be coming soon (a month after I intended, but you know... baby, so bear with me), but in the mean time, here's a simple craft we came up with, that you've likely got all the bits to do already, and if you don't then they are nice and cheap.

You will need:

• a stamp pad. If you've got more than one colour, all the better.
• Craft foam sheets
• Random bits of Lego
• A roll of clear contact paper (sticky back plastic if you are from the 1980s Blue Peter generation like I am)

You've probably noticed that we like playing with Lego in ways other than it was intended. For example, here, here, here and here. I'm also a big fan of making art projects be open to creative diversity, so although the kids love stamping things with stamp pads, we don't have many store bought rubber stamps. If you've been reading Filth Wizardry for a while then you might remember the stamping with plasticine that we did last year. That is still a very popular way to use the stamp pads with the kids, mainly because the possibilities are limitless with it, but it's a very organic, fluid kind of art that you can create in that way.

In contrast to that, I've wanted to find a way that the kids can experiment with the geometric shapes of the bases and tops of various Lego pieces. Lego blocks are already designed to fit together, all measuring multiples of a unit length, so constructing art with them should be interesting. Back in October last year we tried it on paper, but with a silicon baking sheet under the paper to give the needed "squidge" for the solid plastic Lego to make good contact for a decent looking stamp. It was ok, but not brilliant and I never got around to blogging about it. You can see the result in this picture. The good thing about this method was that the kids could colour in their creations with pencils after if they wanted.

This week I remembered that we had some craft foam that hadn't yet been chopped up and used in the bathroom like this, so we tried stamping directly onto the craft foam and it worked beautifully. Just the right amount of squidge for the ink to make really good contact and print cleanly. The other great thing is that it's very easy to clean the water based ink off the Lego pieces after you're done. We just wiped ours clean with a baby wipe.

We had a handful of stamp pads from the dollar store and a roll of clear contact paper to cover the artwork and make useful items from it such as coasters, place mats, book marks and picture frames. The Dollar Tree by us sells stamp pads, packs of craft foam and rolls of contact paper, so if you have some Lego you could do this with a bunch of kids for as little as three dollars.

My six year old was into using the pieces to make representations of objects like flowers, butterflies, people and clouds, but my five year old seemed to enjoy a more abstract approach. They made themselves place mats, but you could easily make a mouse pad as a gift in this way.

You do have to cover the printed foam with the clear contact paper though, because although the stamps take well to the foam, the foam is not going to hold a water based stamp permanently, so the sticky back plastic over the top protects it from getting smudged. I was worried that the contact paper might not adhere well to the craft foam, but it actually sticks to it really well.

You don't have to just do dark coloured stamps on light coloured craft foam either. I had a white stamp pad that we tried on black craft foam and that worked really well too. While the kids were making their place mats, I made a couple of coasters. The large circle was made by dabbing the stamp pad around the rim of a cup. I couldn't resist the urge to see if I could make a millenium falcon coaster, and I think it worked out reasonably recognisable, at least to Star Wars fans anyway.

The kids also made some bookmarks to give to grandma and grandpa.

It's an easy way to decorate a little craft foam photo frame too.

If you've given me enough of your time to get this far down a rather lengthy post then let me reward you with a photo of a cute baby!

I'm sure we'll be having more fun with this way of stamping in the future. If you don't have stamp pads or Lego handy, you can also make all these things without the stamping, by just using Sharpie markers to draw on the craft foam and covering that with the contact paper.

I've got another Lego craft option to blog about, but if I add it onto the bottom of here it'll be the world's longest blog post and I may never get it finished, so hopefully I'll get to that another day (if I can stop staring at my baby long enough)

Can you think of anything else that we could use besides Lego to make interesting stamps with on craft foam?