The Rowdy Pea

bookmarks for the nanas

Ivo loved making these little felt bookmarks for both of his sweet Nanas. He picked out the colors and the stiches and used the foot pedal while I did the needle threading and the steering.  He said, "Hey we're doing teamwork Mom."

We tried to think of a little pun to write in the Mother's Day cards, Josh came up with a few:

For a Nana who's really on the "mark"

For a Nana with a special "place" in our lives

And I thought of one too, sort of a good fit for both of our moms: For a special Nana who probably needs this because she can't go more than three or four pages without being interrupted by someone who needs something from her . . . a bookmark for you!! 

my son bluebeard

 

 I was upstairs getting dressed this morning when Ivo called up the stairs in his most self-satisfied voice, "See Mom, I don't need supervising! I don't need supervising with this after all!" Wow did I make it down the stairs in a hurry, and this is what I saw. But the picture doesn't show the whole story. Ivo, in his masterful attention to detail, had carefully dipped several Q-tips in the blue and black tubs and covered both ears, inside and out, with a thick layer of paint. Of course I couldn't help but burst out laughing, and make a dash for the camera. I don't know what I'll do when my little guy is grown and these silly and unexpected moments are no longer a part of our day-to-day life. And I definitely don't know how I'll get that paint out of his ears. (Did I mention it was both ears? oy.)

the art studio

 

I'm so happy to report that Ivo is once again interested in doing art.  Seeing his supplies arranged in their new environment has made them more appealing somehow, and with the colder weather bringing us indoors more and more, he's made quite a little studio for himself in the breakfast nook.  Last week we arranged some "wonders of nature" and set up the paints. How funny that even though there is no real attempt to mimic the forms of these natural objects, their simple presence enlivens the senses and brings the artistic efforts into focus. I mostly just painted on the paper, but Ivo filled his paper and was then moved to cover a few shells and a lotus seed head with a beautiful wash of blue. 

This weekend I'm going to scan through all of my waldorf and preschool art books and try to come up with some good ideas to keep in mind for the upcoming weeks. We've fallen out of the habit of doing our handwork projects, so maybe we can even pick that up again in time for holiday gift giving.  I was trying to hold off on the Christmas stuff until after Thanksgiving, but I think if we want to do handmade-by-Ivo gifts it's better to start early and go slow and steady.  So if you have any ideas or links to share I would love to hear them!

rainbow jars

Mixing potions is a new favorite game at our house.  I know the glass jars + concrete +bare feet will make a few folks cringe (ahem, Mom) and we usually play with shoes on and in the soft grass to avoid having anything break . But the sound of the wooden spoon mixing water in the glass jars is one of the best parts of the game. It just isn't the same with plastic.  We start with a few drops of food coloring in the bottom of the jars, and then I pour water into the jars until Ivo says stop. After that, the mixing and pouring from jar to jar is all his, and will keep him busy for a long, long time.  Sometimes he likes to play the jars like a xylophone and it really does sound like music.  And I can hear him tapping out different rhythms and experimenting with varying amounts of water in the jars.  He's learning a lot, and it's way cheaper than a piano. So cheers to that!

a book for papa

For Father's Day, Ivo and I made Josh a book about our recent fishing trip up north. Ivo dictated all of the text to me, and then I picked out the pictures and put the pages together. When I asked him what he wanted the title to be, he said "Moby Dick" because that's a grown-up book about fishing. So here are some excerpts from Moby Dick:

To create the text, I put a slide show of our fishing trip pictures on the computer and as we watched it together I asked Ivo to tell the story of our trip. Then I wrote down his words. This was a really fun project and very easy to make.  Ivo loves hearing his story, and Josh said it was his favorite present ever.  Here's the whole story of Moby Dick:

We are going fishing.

We bring my life jacket, the rowers, and a tackle box.

We bounce the oars. 

In the canoe the fish swim under my seat.

We are rowing.

Papa casts his line.

We see a turtle, a line, and a loon.

All the fishes that we caught is model.

Then we row back to the dock.

We feel happy. 

 

We tried to make the cover look like an old-timey leather bound edition (it looks better in person than in this picture). The binding is a pamphlet stitch, which is very easy and only requires a nail and some string. Here are some good directions for making a book with a pamphlet stitch in case you want to make your own story.

 

milkweed pod babies

I went back and fixed the links, so they should work now. Thanks for letting me know.

These milkweed pod babies were inspired by this amazing post from The Little Travelers.  I lovewhat she says about fostering connection, not collection. And that not only makes a lot of sense, but also rhymes. How completely perfect.

These babes were so simple to make. I just put a wooden bead on an inch or two of pipe cleaner and felted wool roving into a little bundle around the pipe cleaner. Then I added the acorn cap and a little more wool to make the milkweed pod cradle nice and soft. They look so sweet I almost wish they were real.

for nana

Making a necklace for Nana's birthday . . .

Happy Birthday Nana!  We hope your special day was full of fun and surprises. We love you!

tissue paper flowers

 

These flowers were so much fun to make and they really turned out pretty, so I thought I would share them here in case anyone else wants to whip up a bouquet of their own.  We made these as a group project with five people--two moms and three kids, all three years old but with varying degrees of dexterity. Everyone was able to do all the steps of the project without frusteration, and with beautiful results all around!

Here's a look at how we made them:

Tissue Paper Flowers

supplies: colorful tissue paper, green pipe cleaners

prep: Cut the tissue paper into squares or circles about 3 inches across (it doesn't have to be exact).  For each flower you will want about five pieces of tissue in varying colors.  I cut all the paper before hand and then just put a pile of squares in the middle of the table for the children to choose from when it was time to get started.

To make the flowers, take the end of a pipe cleaner and gently push it through the center of the tissue paper like in the picture below. For very young children you can hold the tissue pieces taut for them to push the pipe cleaner up and through from below, that makes it very easy to do.  When you have all the issue pieces on the stem, bend the top inch of the pipe cleaner into a little loop, and then use your whole hand to crumple all the layers of paper into one big mish-mash. This has the children amused and befuddled the first time they see it done . . .

And we say, "gee that doesn't look like much of a flower, does it?" But wait and see . . . You can gently uncrumple the tissue mish-mash and you will discover a beautiful bloom . . .voila!

 

If you want to, you can use a dot of glue at the bottom of each bloom to secure everything in place. A little bead pushed up the stem will also do the trick.

For older children and grown-ups, this is a great book about making tissue paper flowers of all kinds. I've used it as a project book with kids ages 6-12 and they loved it and really took off with the ideas. Like the other Klutz books, it comes as a kit with all the supplies, but I noticed that our public library has a copy of just the book part, and the supplies are really easy to find at any craft store. So if you like flowers, check it out! (Does that sound like one of the kids from Reading Rainbow? I was kind of going for that feel. du-dun-dun!)