If you grew up before “screen time” was a thing to worry about, then you’ve made origami paper fortune tellers — also known as cootie catchers or chatterboxes — when you were a kid. Right? One day Mitch came home with a folded paper fortune teller his friend’s mom made to entertain them during a …
Crafty
Here’s some of our favorite crafts!
Got a gamer kid? Break away from the screen with these Minecraft Spawn Eggs, Milk Carton Fairy Houses or a big batch of STEM friendly Electric Play Dough!
Every fall I take the boys out to the local pumpkin patch where we pick out festive holiday gourds…to launch across the field! This year we’re saving some cash — and made our own backyard pumpkin chuckin’ catapult. My hubs helped out with this project. He had some PVC pipe scraps left over from another …
Take your first step in the world of robotics with a brush bot you make yourself with just a toothbrush and a tiny motor. What is a Brush Bot? Brush bots are very simple robots made from a vibrating motor and a small brush that acts as legs. They’re also known as “bristle” bots since …
Like the mystical Magic 8 Ball, a paper fortune teller can reveal the user’s fortune, but only if you know how! Well, maybe. If you don’t remember how to play with a fortune teller, it’s ok. Just jump in my time machine and we’ll head back to the school yard for a little 101 in …
When we switched to a filterless coffee maker I found myself pondering a stack of opened, but no longer needed, coffee filters in my pantry. Hmmmm, what to do? What to do? Coffee filters crafts are pretty easy for kids–in fact, you’ll want to buy stacks of filters just to make all the nifty art …
Sneak some science into your play time! Mitch and I have been designing popsicle stick catapults lately and it’s been so freakin’ fun. (Check out more catapult designs here.) Design this Easy Catapult with craft sticks, a spoon and rubbers bands We first ran into this popsicle stick catapult design at the Magic House maker workshop. …
One thing kids don’t have a lot of is patience–especially when it comes to letting glue dry. They want things to stick RIGHT NOW! Mitch loves crafting with glue and cardboard, and he’s pretty good at it. But most glues don’t dry fast enough for him. He’ll insist on using anything that seems faster, like …
When Mitch was in second grader he got all excited about fairy houses. Mitch doesn’t usually get into fairies and elves, though he has been reading Harry Potter with his dad lately, so maybe that has something do with his new interest. He insisted that we head out to the yard and build one, so obviously …