Category: Crafts and Projects

Homemade bookmarks from cards Make Your Own Bookmarks With Cards
Crafts and Projects · Writing Appearances

Make Your Own Bookmarks With Cards

Brigitte BrulzLeave a comment

My house is filled with books of all sorts, and it is very challenging for me to go more than a week without visiting the library to check out even more books. We love reading in my family! With that being said, we often need bookmarks to mark our spots in the various books we are using. My daughters and I have had fun making our own homemade bookmarks using various cards.

Maybe you and your little ones would enjoy making bookmarks, too, which you can give as gifts to other family members. If you are interested in learning how to make your own unique bookmarks using greeting cards, you can check out my step by step instructions found on Hands On As We Grow. Even preschoolers can make these cute little bookmarks with a personal saying written on the back.

Homemade bookmarks from cards

I love that we can have fun creating the bookmarks together, have various bookmarks throughout the year that vary with the season, and have inexpensive bookmarks that we can share with others.

Do you have any other inexpensive, simple gift ideas to make as Christmas gifts?

Potato hedgehog Make Your Own Potato Creature
Crafts and Projects · Jobs of a Preschooler · Pickles, Pickles, I Like Pickles

Make Your Own Potato Creature

Brigitte BrulzLeave a comment

Recently, my daughter was required to make a creature using a vegetable, fruit, or a potato for one of the clubs that she is a part of. She decided to make her own potato hedgehog using a potato, toothpicks, craft sticks, and pipe cleaners. When she did this project, it reminded me of my book Jobs of a Preschooler when the little girl was a “doctor putting patients back together”.

Doctor preschooler

Here is a picture of her little creature that she named Timothy Hedge the Toothpicked Hedgehog:

Potato hedgehog

This was a simple, inexpensive project that anyone can do at home. Maybe the little ones in your life would enjoy making their own little creatures. They could even make cucumber creatures to go along with the book Pickles, Pickles, I Like Pickles. If you don’t have any cucumbers around, they can make their own cucumber characters with green construction paper like we did at a library storytime I did last month. (If you missed that post, you can read about it here.)

Here are some of the paper cucumber creations from the storytime:

Pickle Family

What creature will your little one create?

One of the disadvantages of creating a creature from food is that they don’t last for a long time; however, we decided to use the hedgehog for a little experiment by cutting it in half. We laid one half cut-side down on a plastic plate, and we left the other half cut-side up to see which one would rot faster. We had assumed that the half with the cut-side exposed would rot faster. After two days, this was the result:

Rotting potato experiment

We were correct. The side that was exposed to the air rotted much faster as you can see in the picture. The piece on the left was the one facing down on the plate, and the piece on the right was the one exposed to the air.

Jobs of a Preschooler- I'm a scientist...

What kinds of experiments can you and your “little scientists” come up with?

 

Pickle coloring pages and pickle activity for Pickles, Pickles, I Like Pickles New Activity for Pickles, Pickles, I Like Pickles
Crafts and Projects · Pickles, Pickles, I Like Pickles

New Activity for Pickles, Pickles, I Like Pickles

Brigitte BrulzLeave a comment

Using the illustrations from Pickles, Pickles, I Like Pickles, I created a worksheet for children to cut and paste steps in the order they occur during the pickle making process. Click on this link: How to Make Pickles to print a free worksheet. Click here: How to Make Pickles Answer Key if you need the answers to the worksheet. Here is a picture after one of my daughters completed the worksheet:

Order the steps for making pickles starting with cucumber seeds

If you are interested in more fun activities to do along with Pickles, Pickles, I Like Pickles and Jobs of a Preschooler, make sure to check out the Fun Extras page. Have a wonderful day!

 

Build Towers without Blocks 25 Tower Building Supplies – No Blocks Required!
Crafts and Projects · Jobs of a Preschooler · Writing Appearances

25 Tower Building Supplies – No Blocks Required!

Brigitte BrulzLeave a comment

(This post contains affiliate links, which means I may make a small commission at no extra cost to you if you make a purchase after clicking on a link. Thank you!)

In Jobs of a Preschooler, the young girl builds a block tower really high. But are blocks the only objects you can use to build towers?

Not at all.

Check out 25 Ways to Build Towers Without Blocks published on Hands On As We Grow as a guest post from me. You may already have all of the supplies at home.

Jobs of a Preschooler- I'm a builder...

Check out these other posts for more building fun.

 

 

Jobs of a Preschooler...I'm a jewelry maker... Jobs of a Preschooler Library Storytime
Crafts and Projects · Events · Jobs of a Preschooler

Jobs of a Preschooler Library Storytime

Brigitte BrulzLeave a comment

(This post contains affiliate links, which means I may make a small commission at no extra cost to you if you make a purchase after you click on a link. Thank you!)

I had a lot of fun yesterday and today presenting my book Jobs of a Preschooler at a library during their preschool storytime. I hope the kids enjoyed it as much as I did. Today we were able to do a little bit more than yesterday. Here is what we were able to do today once the program began:

  • We discussed different jobs that people may have – writer, cleaner, librarian, and more. The kids also shared some jobs that they have at home such as helping with laundry and cleaning up their messes.
  • We talked about words that rhyme since Jobs of a Preschooler has rhyming words. I had glued some pictures with words on to notecards (cat, bat, hat, mat, rat, car, guitar, star, etc.), which I held up for the kids to tell me which words rhymed.
  • I read Jobs of a Preschooler as the kids sat on the floor listening. I told them to try to listen for some more rhyming words as I read. I also asked questions as I read the book such as: Do your parents have a lot of things they have to do throughout their day? What is a meteorologist? Do any of you know how to sing your ABC’s? Who likes to build towers really high? Do you ever help to make a snack or a meal? Do any of you have pets at home? What is the girl doing on the last page? Are you tired at the end of your day doing all of your fun activities?
  • I showed the kids a bag with some seeds to demonstrate what the girl was doing when she was a “scientist”. Some of the kids told me that they have planted seeds to grow vegetables and flowers.

Jobs of a Preschooler- I'm a scientist...

  • The kids gathered at a few tables, and we decorated “microphones” with various stickers and crayons. I created the microphones ahead of time using toilet paper rolls, paper, tape, aluminum foil, and hot glue. (I taped the paper around the toilet paper tubes. I rolled aluminum foil into balls and hot glued them to the top of the toilet paper tubes.) Here is a picture of three of the unfinished microphones:

Jobs of a Preschooler- I'm a singer...

  • After they were finished decorating their microphones (and we pretended to turn them all on), we sang the alphabet together just like the girl in Jobs of a Preschooler.
  • In the story, the girl uses string and large beads to make jewelry. Instead of using string, we made bracelets with pipe cleaners and pony beads. A couple of kids decided to combine more than one pipe cleaner to make necklaces. Here are a couple of the bracelets with a pipe cleaner and pony beads:

Jobs of a Preschooler...I'm a jewelry maker...

  • At the end, the kids were able to go home with the items they had made, coloring and activity pages to go along with Jobs of a Preschooler, and a bookmark. (Click here if you would like to print coloring pages.)

Jobs of a Preschooler coloring pages and activity sheet

The time went by really fast. I really hope I am able to go back again to do a storytime for Pickles, Pickles, I Like Pickles.