Watermelon 'Sorbet'

I bought a whole watermelon a while ago and we were unable to finish it so I froze it rather than waste the delicious fruit. I had the vague idea I could use it to make watermelon slushies. When we were ready to make the slushies, I started blending...

When it started looking like this I thought it would be a shame to waste this on a slushie when it looked just like sorbet. So I put it in a glass instead and ate it.

Instructions:

To make Watermelon 'sorbet' freeze cubes of watermelon. Once they are frozen blend the cubes until it is a sorbet consistency and serve in a glass or ice-cream cone. I added maple syrup to this to make it extra sweet. Mmmm, delicious.

Painting with Little Children

One of my biggest problems when painting with my children is the paints either spilling or getting mixed up.

We recently started using egg cartons to divide the paints up and it has been quite effective. I put a squirt of each colour in to the bottom of the cups and then the kids can use the paints. I make sure that there is a container of water. So far we have avoided mixing the colours up, and this is after the children had been painting for almost 40 minutes uninterrupted.

Cold Banana Ice-Cream

I had a few bananas that were starting to get very ripe so I peeled them, broke them into pieces and froze them. All I had to do was wait for the perfect combination of a hot day, and a day when I remembered that I had these frozen gems all ready to make some mini 'ice-creams'. After the children had worn themselves out on the trampoline we enjoyed our home made ice-cream (I know it doesn't have any cream in it, but any other descriptive term doesn't encompass the creamy texture of the creation).

I put the frozen banana pieces into the blender and turned it on. I forgot to put my hand on the top and the lid came flying off. Our second attempt was more successful.

The bananas take around 5 minutes to blend properly in my blender. I had to stop blending a few times to scrape down the sides. Then we were able to see it happen...our banana lumpy mix turned from this mix here (see below)...

To this incredible looking soft serve banana ice-cream.

All there was left to do was put them into some tiny ice-cream cones.

This banana ice-cream mix does not refreeze very well without crystalising and becoming more like an ice-block rather than ice-cream, so I mostly just freeze 2 bananas at a time and that gives all of my children a lovely serve.

Stained Glass Window Paints

I have had a packet of window paints in the cupboard for a while. It seems like it is something that is too hard for the children to manage on their own without extensive assistance from me. I had a little more time than usual this week so thought I would give it a go. I traced the design from the book with the black paints and let it completely dry. Once it was dry then I let the children loose with the paints. My only stipulation was they could only use one paint at a time and needed to let it dry before moving on. Well, it is a good thing the paint dried very quickly or the first photo would have been as far as the picture developed.

The Toy Collection Agency

I have been getting very frustrated with my kids when it comes time to tidy up and leave the house. I like to tidy the house before I go out so that if I am tired when we come back there is nothing I need to do. My  children love pulling all their toys out and playing with them. They are even reasonably happy to pack up in a desultory way. The thing that really bothers me is how they pack up. There will always be one or two things that are left behind - trains left out of the train box, cars left lying in the middle of the floor, pencils that have rolled under the table and have been left behind. I end up spending my day putting away all the odd toys that have been forgotten

I had a talk to the boys about why this was happening and what we can do to make mornings easier for us all. Kit thought that we should have an op-shop bag that all the toys left out are put in. James thought that he should be able to get the toys back after a few days.

So we have instituted the Toy Collection Agency to combine both ideas. Once the boys have tidied their room and invite me in to check, I will put anything that has been left out in a tub in the laundry. They have a week to do extra jobs so they can earn their toys back. 1 job = 1 toy. If they don't want to earn the toys back then we should give them to the op shop.

To make this easy, we painted a small box gold and placed a magnet on the back.

Then we printed out a list of jobs for the children to do. The criteria for the jobs is that they must be jobs that I wouldn't ordinarily ask them to do.  My boys had a lovely time coming up with jobs they think would be a help to me (and a few of them are jobs they really want to try).

Finally we wrote a reminder on the box for the children so that they remember what it is they need to do to earn their toys back. Now it lives on the fridge where it is easily accessible.

So far we haven't had any toys left out :-)

Gingerbread House

Here we have our Christmas gingerbread house. Last year I decided to just buy a gingerbread house kit from the supermarket (seen above). This year we are planning on making our own to give friends as presents, so hopefully I'll be able to post it before Christmas as well as this one. We  made some royal icing to glue the lollies on to the house as decorations. This icing dries really quickly, so it is ideal for small children to use as glue! I found that this recipe made enough icing for two houses. 

Royal Icing Recipe

2 cups of sifted icing sugar

2 egg whites

1 lemon

1. Whisk the egg whites to stiff peaks 

2. Gradually add the sugar with a squeeze of lemon juice.

Cubby House

I watched an episode of Better Homes and Gardens a while ago and Tara made a cubby house by cutting a piece of material slightly larger than the top of her dining table. Then she measured the height of the table and cut two pieces that were the height and length of the table, and two pieces that were the width of the table. She quickly sewed it together, cut a door and glued on decorations.

This is our version of it with scraps of material from my sewing cupboard. We wanted the doorway on one of the shorter sides because of the way our table is placed in the dining room this gives the best access. I love the way that the children can play with the cubby house and when they are done, I can fold it up to put in a cupboard. It is easier to store than most toys.

Glass Tile Pendants

I went along to the craft fair last month and was determined to find a project to make with the kids that could then be given as gifts. Sounds easy? Well, I discovered to my chagrin that the craft fair mostly caters to adults. After circling the stalls once I had to make my way around a second time scouring the stalls for something I could bring home for the boys to make. In the end I came up with a glass tile pendant kit. The lady on the stall assured me that it was extremely simple, suitable for all ages and hard to make a mistake with. It ticked all the boxes, and I was sold when she told me that each kit contained enough to make 9 items. 

On arriving home I inspected the kit closely and discovered that there were a variety of beautiful papers to chose from to decorate my jewellery.

To make the pendants there are only a few steps.

1. Pick a paper that you like and is larger than the pendant you want to attach it to.

2. Cover the back of the pendant with diamond glaze and press it onto the paper then leave it to dry

Waiting for the diamond glaze to dry

 3. Once the glaze has dried, take a sharp pair of scissors or sharp knife and trim the excess paper from the pendant. It is best to do this at an angle so that there is no paper left overhanging the edge
4. Coat the paper with 2 coats of clear nail varnish or diamond glaze and leave it to dry again

the trimmed pendants waiting to have a bail attached

5. Super glue a bail to the back of the pendant (or glue to something else!)

The only part I wouldn't let the children do was use the super glue. I told them it was strong enough to glue their fingers together and only adults were allowed to use super glue safely. It was then rather mortifying when I did accidentally glue my fingers together while finishing the tiles.

Here are two of the finished tiles.

Painting Gnomes

Floriade has a gnome knoll and every year I buy a gnome for the children to decorate. Just a warning - this is something I haven't done with the kids yet

This year Majura Womens Group decided to have a gnome painting session. I wasn't sure if I wanted to paint a gnome, but in the end joined in so I could spend the morning chatting to friends over paint and coffee (I had to keep reminding myself that my coffee was not the water for washing paintbrushes). The morning flew by and having such creative people around me inspired me to a more ambitious gnome - well, more ambitious than a plain coloured dress.

Did you know that this flesh colour on my gnome is pink and yellow? Thanks Kristen. I had to write it down so that I don't forget for when the boys make their ones.

I like to call this one my chameleon gnome. Okay, she does stand out a little on bare rocks, but put her near some flowers and grass, and she will disappear! She came out of a discussion on fashions through the ages. I thought that the early 2000s was iconic for the transparent dresses worn on the catwalk. Not everyone agreed with me, and perhaps it would be a little too risqué, so the chameleon gnome is the see-through G rated version of this.

Organising my Cupboard

My lovely friend Ani asked me to write about how I organise my cupboard. Since I collect all sorts of boxes, bottle tops, odds and ends, it is rather an effort to keep my craft cupboard tidy. I try really hard not to cram things in, but when I am in a rush that is what happens.

Here is my cupboard. The top part with the lock is for the things that need an adult to supervise or I have collected for a particular purpose. The children have the bottom part of the cupboard and are allowed to use anything from there whenever they want. 

This is inside the children's part of the craft cupboard. It does need a bit more of a tidy up, but it gives you an idea of the way in which I organise it.

The bottom shelf is scrap paper and cardboard. My mother keeps all the coloured cardboard dividers when she has to shred documents for work. They are fantastic for drawing pictures on. There are also old newspapers and foam sheets.

The middle shelf is full of shoe boxes. Each shoe box is labelled with its contents. One has cardboard rolls, another has stamps, another has egg cartons, ribbons, matchsticks and so on. It makes it easy to know where everything is.

The top shelf has bags of material scraps on the left, empty boxes on the right and a red plastic box in the middle. This is the shelf that is in daily use and the contents of it are rarely the same two weeks in a row. If I was to take a photo of it next week then I have no doubt that the boxes would have been used and most of the material scraps. Then it would be a case of the types of recyclable materials we collect to replace them with.

The red box is the children's quick craft box. It has a selection of paper, ribbons, bottle tops, interesting pictures, scissors and glue. This is what they pull out every day and the rest of the craft items are used when they are making something in particular. I find if the container is too full, then the children become overwhelmed and don't make anything. I try and change the contents of the box regularly so that the children will have different items to inspire their artwork.It is our version of Play School's useful box.

Car Trundle

As anyone with children will know, it feels like toys multiply whenever you're not looking and suddenly you are tripping over toys every time you turn around.

My biggest problem has always been finding a home for cars and trains. They are so small that it is easy to miss one or two when packing up. I seem to be standing on them all the time. Given that I like walking around the house in bare feet (or my sock slippers), it was only a matter of time before I had to find a solution. After stepping on a car for the 3rd time in a morning, I took myself to the shed to try to see if I had any containers that the boys would find easy to open and therefore find it easier to put the cars away. I didn't have any containers but the big piece of wood that fell on me as I opened the shed door did attract my attention. When my gaze wandered over 4 wheels the idea of a car table came to me. Wouldn't it be so much easier if I made a trundle to store the cars on, and we could just push it out of the way under the bed when the boys finished playing with it?

I dragged the wood out, screwed the wheels onto it and flipped it over to see if it worked. By this time Christopher joined me and wanted to know what I was doing. When I said I was making a car table, he pointed out the obvious fact that there was nothing to stop the cars rolling off the trundle. Hmmmm...I needed sides on it. Back to rummaging around the shed and I found some long pieces of wood that I could nail  on and form a shallow box.

My part was done. I undertook to keep everyone away while Christopher painted the whole table blue. When the first coat dried we drew the road on to the table and painted it black. Christopher then found a sponge and sponged green paint everywhere else. The final touches were applied the next day when I put the white markings on the roads and we moved the table into the house.

Just need to put all the cars on it and we
can push it under the bed until the boys
want to play with it.

This is currently the longest lasting of all the toys that the children play with in our house. I wonder how many more years it will keep them entertained quietly for...

Swan Costumes

Having a child at school means that occasionally I am faced with the need to scrabble around my cupboards to produce a costume in record time.

So, dear friends, we have today's problem. How to make a swan costume so my son can go as one of the Wild Swans to his fairy tale dress up at school this week. My google search failed me. I couldn't find any pictures of swan costumes for boys. Why is it that dressing up as a swan seems to be considered a girls domain?

After stewing on this for a few days I have decided to bite the bullet and make up my own pattern for the costume. Or rather, go to the shops and buy a white hoodie to add wings to. At the shops I found a gorgeous fluffy jacket that serves the purpose. Two circles of black felt with googly eyes stuck to them and an orange triangle with a black v glued on make the swan face on the hood, and some tulle with ruffled edges make the wings.

Finished swan costume. Just need to find the child to try it on!

Phew. If only my kids remain happy with the home made effort for their schooling lives, I'll be happy.