Valentine's Cards for Classmates

This year I came up with a new idea for the annual Valentine's Day card exchanges for my girls' classmates. In years past we have bought Valentine's cards, but it always seems so impersonal. We've also made cards (with glue, doilies, colorful paper, etc), but my daughter is usually bored and/or frustrated by the third card and I end making all the cards. This year I had my 8-year-old draw out her designs with marker and artist crayons on 5.5" X 8" paper (a regular piece of paper, cut in half). For my 3-year-old, I drew hearts on the paper and had her color them. I scanned the artwork into the computer as JPEG files, cleaned up and added text (if needed) in Gimp and imported them into OpenOffice. I then resized them to fit 12 on a page (really easy, you just grab the "handles" and move to the correct size). I made them each approximately 2.5" X 3.5". I am printing them on card stock and cutting them apart with a box cutter. The girls will write names on the back. Handmade artwork without the "production line" frustration! (and of course, I had to get in on the act as well, I used stencils for the lettering on my "crossword" Valentine!)

Scrappy Little Nordic House Ornaments

As gifts for teachers. Based on this tutorial: Nordic House Ornaments by Orange Flower: Sketchbook - I used the templates for the roof, windows and doors. However, I wanted to make them look more whimsical (and, I was avoiding embroidery because time was an issue), so the final look is inspired by Tallgrass Prairie Studio's Little House Table Topper (a very loose interpretation!) I let the girls choose fabrics from my scraps (I pulled out reds, greens and whites to keep things simpler). Also, for my 3-year-old (who has 3 teachers) I gave her white backgrounds for her houses to prevent too much craziness!

Paper Dolls

I came home from work Saturday night (I work as a waitress, so it was late) to find these beautiful paper dolls sitting on the dining room table. I quizzed my husband, "was she bored and you told her to draw something?" "No." "Did she find the idea in a book?" "No." "Was she looking at pictures of people in costumes?" "No, she just sat at the table and made them." Amazing... (the one on the far right has leaves for hair and on the bodice of her dress)

Variations on a Leaf Craft

My 7-year-old was bored and demanded that someone suggest something fun to do (because, of course, most of my original suggestions involved chores). So I told her to go outside and gather some leaves. When she came in, I showed her and her 3-year-old sister how to do leaf rubbings with crayons on paper, as I had seen on this post on maya*made. (we skipped the watercolor part)

Well, little miss 3 didn't have much patience for this rubbing sort of craft, and soon settled on making something completely of her own imagination involving two of her very favorite activities in the whole entire world - gluing and cutting. She created quite the work of art, I believe. It had to be put in the window, too, just like big sister's leaf rubbings!

First (Pumpkin) Face

My 3-year-old drew her first ever (recognizable) face - on her pumpkin Friday night. She then checked it against the face her sister drew on her pumpkin...

and returned to make the eyes bigger on hers as well.

Then she sat down and drew her first ever, umm, human figure. Of course, I think she's a prodigy ;)