School Portait Solution

This is my newest Punky Sprout album using the new Teenie Beanie Sprout.  I used the blue and pink Authentique lines to do a book for my kids' school portraits.  I never knew what to do with them...as a stay-at-home-mom, it seems they are always with me, so I don't even keep a copy in my wallet! :)  We have the current year's picture on the wall but this way we can look back and see them grow!  I decided to do it by grade instead of year...so that I could see what each kid looked like at the same age.

I wanted to keep this super simple because I know the kids will want to flip through it a lot and I just felt that I wanted the focus to be the portraits.  Since the paper is pretty busy, I kept the embellishments to just the numbers and a little punched strip.  The numbers for each grade are from Bella Blvd and are white.  I used my Copic Markers to color them.  On each one, I used 3 different shades and blended them together.  This was my first time using Copics and I have to say that I now know why so many people are addicted! :)

 The Lil' Petal banner pieces are some of my favorite Punky embellishments but they were much too large for me to spell out school on the cover of this little album.  I learned this little trick from Punky owner Shelly!

Take the bottom tip of the triangle and fold it up to the top.

Cut along each side of the folded up triangle.

Then cut the remaining diamond in half.

You just made one banner piece into 4 mini banners!

Thanks A Latte!

Not sure why I have decided that all Teacher Appreciation gifts should be "punny" but it seems I have! :)  Here is what we made the teachers for yesterday.  I totally took the easy way out and printed it from here!  I knew this is what I wanted to do and was going to make a card but when I saw this one, I thought it was perfect!

Teacher Appreciation Week

Last year I had a blast with our Teacher Appreciation gifts. (day 1, day 2, day 3, day 4, day 5)  I haven't done the gifts from us yet but this year at Isaac's school, I have been leading the 5th grade leadership class.  I have about 15 fifth graders that I meet with for 20 minutes every other week.  For teacher appreciation week, I thought it would be fun if the leadership class had a little something for every teacher, every day.  Keep in mind that we therefore had 20 minutes for 1 kids to make 100 little gifts! :)  Luckily, they are great kids and we were able to finish all of these!  I made it so that they just had to do a bit of work on each one.  Here's what we did:

Day 1: I have a couple girls who like to do their "creative" writing so they wrote berry on these.

 Day 2: I thought these would be challenging to make but the 3 girls working on them, whipped through them!  I used the instructions from here.  There are little fortunes inside that say "We are fortunate to have you at West!"

 

Day 3: This one was for all the artists...they all did different borders.

Day 4: I cut the slits on the printed circles ahead of time and then they used one of my big punches and then slid it on the pencil.  This was the last one I decided to do and I think it turned out to be my favorite.

Day 5: The flowers were cut out on my Cricut which made this easier to prepare!  The kids wrote "Thanks for helping us bloom" on the flowers.

Blockheads

I saw these in my Family Fun magazine a couple months ago and wanted to make them with the kids.  My dad gave us a container of "junk" to use and we saved some lids and things that normally would have gone in the recycling bin.

 

We had a blast making these!  Tadd cut us 4" blocks off an old 2x4 and we were ready!  I wiped each block off with a towel but we didn't sand them or anything although I suppose it wouldn't hurt! :)  We painted one day and then put all the junk on the next.

 The Family Fun site recommends a pretty strong glue but I was afraid it would be too strong for the kids to use so I bought Aleen's Tacky glue...something I knew was safe enough for them to use!  It held everything great!  I put some on a paper plate and gave the kids q-tips to apply it!  Worked like a charm!

 
Here are our Blockheads!
                                             Isaac's "Graduating Darth Vader":  :)

                                              Erin's "Monster with a Top Hat":

 

Isaac's "Luke Skywalker":  (see the light saber?)

 

 Erin's "Pink Princess":

 

I couldn't resist playing along too!  They just looked like they were having so much fun!  So I made a freckled, buck-toothed elephant listening to music! :)

Teacher Appreciation Week...Day 5

A little later than I have been with this post but here is Day 5's treat!  Filled with all the makings of some good old fashioned S'mores!

Here's the rest, in case you missed them!
Day 1: You're "Tea"riffic!
Day 2: You're Out of this World!
Day 3: You're O"fish"ally a Super Teacher!
Day 4: Thanks for Making Me a Smartie!

Teacher Appreciation Week...Day 4

Isaac insisted on being in the picture this time!  Not sure what this smile/laugh/facial expression is that he's got going on but I think he's cute anyway! :)

Teacher Appreciation Week...Day 3

Here's our Wednesday treat for his teachers!  (those are gummy fish!)  And he even talked me into using my Sassafras feltie fish!

Teacher Appreciation Week...Day 2

We're having fun with this, this year!  Isaac loves doing it all himself!  And I think he especially loves that he gets to use my scrapbooking paper and supplies!  We taped the rockets on the back of the candy bars.  (he has 2 teachers.)

Teacher Appreciation Week...Day 1

I don't know how this sneaks up on me every year but it does! I needed a quick and easy token to send tomorrow. Found this list of ideas. We went with "You're Tea-rrific" I let Isaac (Kindergarten) do all of it himself. In fact, I had a tag out for him to make and it was his idea to spell it out with the tea!

I'll show you what we make each day this week! But even if you don't have the time, don't forget to thank a teacher!

Crayon Rolls

I made these last night for our vacation! I got the tutorial here. The tutorial was well written and really easy to follow even for a novice sewer like me! A couple things I would change...not sure if I would use the iron-on vinyl. As she says in the tutorial it makes the crayons slide out a little easier and to be honest, I'm not sure I would care too much if the material got marked up! She has another tutorial here for one NOT using the vinyl! Also...I would probably not add the ric rac. But that is more because of my sewing abilities (or lack thereof!) than the tutorial or how it looks! I just didn't get it pinned right on either one. So on Isaac's there isn't enough showing and then on Erin's it is too much! But I LOVE the toggle on the cord! All the other tutorials I found used a tie closure and I knew that my kids can't do that! Isaac can do this all on his own! Which is great since he'll be in the backseat and he can help Erin with hers! All in all a very successful sewing project for me! :)

Happy Easter!

Thought I'd do an early Easter post as I have time right now and am not sure if I will again before Easter! I made these cute little chocolate bunnies using Hershey Nuggets, the patterned paper from the April AWDML Kit, and a little bunny head stamp that my friend Amanda let me use! She also had a tail stamp but the thought of cutting out so many little tails was not my idea of fun! So we ran over to JoAnn's and bought some bunny tails! :) Isaac had a great time putting these bunnies together for his teachers and classmates!

Yellowstone...Here We Come!

Well, the countdown is down to 4 days! I can hardly believe that today is Tadd's last day of school! I think the weather has really thrown me for a loop! We usually have at least a few nice days in May and June but this spring has been super cold! We're breaking records almost everyday for how cold it is!

Today I made these activity books for the kids to take on vacation. I know Isaac will use his in the car. I don't think Erin will be able to but I made her one for in the motels and restaurants. I just went through all their color books and activity books and ripped out pages and also printed some out from Crayola! They had great activities. I used Rusty Pickle pp...loved the signs...one even says Yellowstone! And the map doesn't have Yellowstone on it but it is totally all the places we went last summer!

Hope you all have a great start of summer! Catch ya when we return from Yellowstone!

Children's Museum and a Countdown to Yellowstone!

Now that Isaac is out of school...I am trying to keep him busy until Yellowstone. Today we went to The Children's Museum with some friends. They have a new dinosaur exhibit. It is the "year of the dinosaur" in Portland. The_Children's_Museum, OMSI, and even the zoo all have dino exhibits right now. Good timing as Isaac LOVES dinosaurs!


Yesterday we (Isaac and I) were very busy! He made a book of holidays! He drew a picture of every holiday (including his b-day! LOL) and then we made a cover and then I bound it with my BIA! He kept saying "Is it a REAL book? " Funny! I will take pictures but this morning he had to show his dad and he laid it on the bathroom floor and it ruined the cover! So we have to redo that!


Then we made a countdown to Yellowstone because 3 weeks to a 4 year-old doesn't mean much! He kept waking up and asking if we were going today! Didn't think I could handle that for 18 more days! =) I used some very old supplies! Don't even know when I got those little paper doll hikers! Pictures aren't great because I hung it in front of a window!

Mother's Day Tea

Isaac's preschool had a little mother's day tea today. We made flower pencil holders that they had already painted. In class they had made us tiles with their handprints on them. So cute! But the best part was the card. The teacher had interviewed each kid with questions about their mom. Here are Isaac's answers:

What is your mom's name? Lynn
What is you mom's favorite food? Watermelon
What is your mom's job? Laundry
What is your mom's favorite TV show? Rachel Ray
What is your mom's favorite thing to do? Snuggle with me
What is your favorite thing to do with your mom? Paint

The laundry one really got me...it is what I am the worst at! Seems I am never caught up! =) Anyway, it was a fun way to start a mother's day weekend! Tomorrow...scrapbooking with friends from 2-11! WooHoo!

And these are what Isaac made for his teachers. He did all the painting himself. We were going to put dots on both of them but the first 3 dots he did on the pink one must have looked like a face to him because then he put a smile on it! We did the dots with a pencil eraser. He also picked out all the colors and flowers himself!

Little Birdies

Isaac made this bird nest this morning while Erin ate breakfast. He had searched through a book I have of preschool art projects and picked this one. The only thing we didn't have was brown paint! I tried to mix some up but it ended up a bit purple. But Isaac said, "It's OK, we can make our bird nest whatever color we want!" How right he is!