Arts and Crafts

Halloween Crafts – Fuzzy Spiders

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What you will need:

 

  • 2 black pipe cleaners
  • 2 googly eyes
  • large button with 4 holes
  • black construction paper

What to do:

 

    1. Cut pipe cleaners in half.
    2. Push pipe cleaners halfway through each hole of the large button.
    3. Bend and shape the pipe cleaners to look like legs.
    4. Cut out the spider’s head and body section from black construction paper.
    5. Glue body to the top of the button.
    6. Glue eyes to the body.

 

 

Arts and Crafts: Leprechaun Hat

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What You Need

1/2 gallon round ice cream container, clean and dry, without lid
4 pieces of Green felt
1 piece of Gray felt
1 piece of Black felt
1 yard of Green ribbon about 1/2″ wide
Scissors
Ruler
Black permanent marker
Glue
Hole punch
Large circular object (however wide the felt is)

 

How To Make It

  1. Using black marker, trace around the bottom of ice cream container on green felt.
  2. Cut out the circle and glue it to the bottom of the ice cream container.
  3. Cut a piece of green felt to go around the container (you may need two pieces of felt) and glue it around the container.
  4. Punch a hole right below the lip of the container. Repeat on the opposite side. This will be where you place the ties for your hat.
  5. Trace around a large circular object that is bigger than the opening of the ice cream container and cut out the circle. This will be the brim of the hat.
  6. Sit the ice cream container, open side down, on the middle of the felt circle. Trace around the container.
  7. Cut the circle out of the middle of the large felt circle. Discard this inner circle piece. Now you can see that this is the brim.
  8. Cut small lines 2″ into the brim (cut from the inside of the circle). This creates “tabs” that will allow you to push the “tabs” up inside the hat and glue in place.
  9. Turn the ice cream container/hat on the flat end. Lay the circle with the snips on top of the open end of the container. Run a bead of glue around the inside of the container near the rim. Push the tabs up into the container and against the glue.
  10. Once the glue has set up, punch a hole in the felt on the brim of the hat next to the hole on the ice cream container. Repeat for other side.
  11. Cut a strip about 2″ wide out of the black felt.
  12. Cut a 4″ square out of the gray felt.
  13. Cut a rectangle in the middle of the gray felt about 1 1/4″ x 2″. Discard the little piece of felt.
  14. Lay black band around the hat about an inch above the brim. Cut off any excess felt where it meets in the back. Glue in place.
  15. Lay the gray (buckle) over the black band where you want it to appear. Glue in place.
  16. Cut the piece of ribbon in half. Thread one piece of ribbon from the inside of the hat to the outside. Tie a double or triple knot on the inside of the hat with one end of the ribbon. Take the piece of ribbon on the outside and push down through the hole in the brim. Repeat with the other piece of ribbon.
  17. Place the hat on your head and tie the ribbon in a bow under your chin.

Note: You might also want to make a Shamrock out of green construction paper and have it sticking out of the band around the hat.

 

Dress all in green and don’t forget to place a hammer in your black belt! You can always make a hammer out of grey and brown foam.

 

If you have a small or medium sized pail, cover it with black felt or paper. Cut out disks/circles from cardboard and color them in gold. Fill the pail with gold and carry it around too.

Arts and Crafts: Leprechaun Trap

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What You Need

  • Shoe box without lid
  • Aluminum foil
  • Glue
  • Green felt or paper
  • Shamrock stickers or cut out ones you created
  • Scissors
  • Stick about twice the depth of the box.

How To Make It

  1. Cover a shoe box with aluminium foil using glue to hold it in place.
  2. Cut shamrocks out of felt or paper to decorate your trap. You can also use stickers for this.
  3. Glue the shamrocks, if not using stickers, to the box.
  4. The night before St. Patrick’s Day, put a stick under the box so that the box is lifted up on one end. Leave it out by your front door.
  5. If a leprechaun stops by, he’ll leave a surprise for you! Perhaps some green candies or a few shiny pennies.

Making Friendship Journals

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A friendship journal is one of the best gifts that a person can receive. They are special because they are hand made with lots of personal thoughts behind them. Friendship journals are a nice way to show your pen pal how special they are to you and how much their friendship means. These journals show your friends that you value their friendship and you know their likes, dislikes, hopes and dreams. These books make wonderful Christmas and birthday presents. Here are a few things to remember when creating a journal.

 

Talk About Your Culture

Most pen pals try to look for people from other countries and cultures to write too. When you are creating your friendship journal, make sure you talk about your own country and the traditions of your people. For example, if you are from the Czech Republic your friend will love to hear how every summer solstice there is a huge parade and celebration in the town of Cesky Krumlov that lasts for one week. Talk about why the tradition or celebration happens and what you like about it. Try to include a picture or two (postcards are good ideas) that shows something special about where you live.

 

Talk About Being A Friend

Discuss what being a good friend means to you. Tell your pen pal why they are a good friend. Perhaps you are someone who can write poetry. Create a poem that is about your friend and add it to the journal. If your friend did something special for you, or made you feel really good about yourself, tell them. Is there something you admire about your friend? Do they have a quality that attracts you to them? Let them know what is unique and special about themselves. Do you have a special memory to share with your friend? Create a ‘Friendship Village Tour’ in your journal where you take your friend for a walk through the village and stop at a few important shops along the way. Shops can include security, trust, love, honesty, respect, value, compassion and more.

 

Share Your Creative Side

First of all, pick out a journal that you can add lots of great things too. Scrapbooks are perfect for this. Don’t worry if you do not like the picture on the journal or scrapbook because you can cover that with plain paper and decorate it yourself. To start your journal off with something special, create a friendship page by using your name and your friends name and decorating it. You can always find some colorful stickers to decorate your pages with. If you do not want to use stickers, draw pictures and color them in with bright cheery colors. Write a story for your friend and include pictures to help tell the story. How about drawing a picture of your friend. Even if you do not know what they look like, it would be fun to imagine and to draw what you see in your head. Create a friendship card and paste it to one of the pages in the journal. Your can even design and decorate a special page with all your own pen pal information on it. This way your friend will always have a resource to turn to when creating things for you. Your pen pal friend will love turning the pages to see all the wonderful words of friendship and colorful designs.

 

The Sky Is Your Limit

There really is no limit to what you can put into a friendship journal. Add recipes, crafts ideas and instructions, drawings, special occasion cards, poetry, short stories, pictures from magazines, cartoons, stickers, bookmarks, address labels, pressed flowers, etc… Once your friendship journal is complete, simply package it up and send it off to your friend. I can assure you, they will be pleasantly surprised and very happy.

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