For art this week we are keeping it pretty simple. Some fun coloring pages an making mask. We’re using felt and other materials for our mask but there is a pack of printable ones below for your enjoyment. We have also started to focus on social studies lessons more. To begin with I’m using the Top Secret Adventures packs we are subscribed to. I use what they send as well as build lessons around the packs. We love these packs. I got into them as a child and love that I can now share the fun and learning with my children! So far I have had great success using these fun educational packs in our school days, they really do make learning fun as it always should be in my opinion! If you don’t already know about them, you can read more about what they are exactly and what they come with in the previous blog post I wrote when we initially started receiving them – Enjoy Adventure & Mystery Right At Home. I also enclosed (below and in the blog post) the links needed for y’all to sign your Little’s up and start the adventures in your home! Also check out the Smurf mushroom homes we made a couple of years ago and the how to steps to make your own below! Links for everything below and more Smurf packs will be sent out soon!
DIY Smurf Homes!
These were pretty easy. These were the first things kiddo paper mached without help. They are a couple of years old now so not as great as when we first did them, but I think they have held up really well over the years. Especially considering how frequently they are still used. The materials we used for this project were 2 litter bottle, acrylic paint, poster board, hot glue, tape, and clear spray paint to seal it all.
The bottoms are formed with poser board and tape. after they were together they were paper mached with alternate layers of news paper and paper towels for extra stability. Making the paper mache a little more watered down than normal gave everything a ridged effect as it dried which helped the look in my opinion. The entrances were cut after everything dried. When I cut them I was concerned about kiddo possibly getting paper cuts or scratched up hands because of how sharp they felt with the hardened paper mache. To avoid that I beaded hot glue around the edged the doorways and as an added precaution I did the same to the edges of the tops. After they dries we painted them with 4 different shades of brown using a sponge for texture. We were going to paint the insides as well and add some stickers but the kid was to excited to play with them so we never got around to it. I’m thinking it will be one of our Smurf art projects for this or next Saturday.
While the bottoms dried we moved on to the tops. They were made using uneven cut off ends of 2 litter soda bottles and then paper mached. We used the layering methode here as well. Paper towel is much easier to shape and mold which greatly helped on the edges. We ended with a news paper layer but to be sure we didn’t lose the shape we wanted we stayed away from the edged.
Once everything was dry we hot glued the tops to the bottom using a significant amount of hot gorilla glue to make sure they would stay together for as long as possible. When possible, I always hot glue everything together before adding paper mache just for a little added security, however this time it would have been more difficult to glue everything together before adding the paper mache. We painted them with the same type of paint using a sponge as well. The circles were done with various sized round sponges.
It wasn’t my favorite project but the kid loved it and still uses them to this day.
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