A Matter of Choice

A few weeks ago Louka and I were unusually home alone as Leo had gone to play with a school friend, unused to being without his brother he was a bit sad about not being able to go too so I decided to cheer him up by getting the paints out and giving him something to create. I remembered that Leo and I had created Autumn trees several years ago so I decided to recycle the same idea! Louka was very impressed to be told we would be painting our arms and hands to use as the tree,  of course he wanted me to do it as well and I think his favourite part of the activity was painting me! For the leaves I gave him the choice of cotton buds as well as paint brushes, and I showed him how to make a bigger selection of autumn colours by mixing the paint that we had. I only took one photo which is rare for me but we both enjoyed the fact I put the camera down and got stuck into the paints! He carried on for quite a while, asking for several more bits of paper and happily mixing co...

The other week my friend Sam was due to come round for the afternoon for our usual tea / chat and for the kids to play.  As we've noticed recently that they seem to play nicely until about 4pm when all hell breaks loose this time she came prepared with distractions! Sam is the master of kiddy crafts and not only did she arrive with a plan, she brought everything needed to create not one but three masterpieces. As it was the day that was supposed to be the best to see the Perseid Meteor shower the plan was to make telescopes, binoculars and rockets. Armed with paints, toilet rolls, stickers and card she explained to two very excited children what they had to do.... and they actually listened! We ended up with extendible telescopes - two kitchen rolls painted black, one inside the other and decorated with silver stars. Binoculars - two toilet roll tubes painted and decorated, then stuck together and string attached. Rocket ships - more toilet rolls t...

Although it may seem that I am excelling myself at the moment with interesting things to do with Leo with the recent homemade alphabet book and pirate treasure game  I'm still constantly racking my brains (well, searching the internet!) for more things to do. I never imagined a day with a toddler could be so long, after all I've had enough boring jobs in my life and I thought nothing could top them - I didn't realise that a day with a demanding toddler can be equally as hard but in different ways! Ideally I try to do 'something interesting' as he puts it at least once a day, an 'interesting activity can last anything from 30 minutes to maybe an hour if it's a particularly good one, add that to some cleaning (he's likes to 'help') lunch, some reading, a bit of tv, maybe a trip to the shop or Grandparents and dinner then we make it through the day with minimal damage! This week at a loss for an idea I got the paints out and gritted my tee...

You may already know that craft activities are not something that comes naturally to me, add my complete lack of patience and a wilful toddler into the mix and it's not something that usually fills me with joy! However Leo does get very excited and I thought as it's Christmas it would give me something to blog about it would be a lovely thing to do :) I really can't remember if I saw this idea on another blog - if I did and you know which one let me know and I'll credit it as it seems unlikely I would have come up with the idea all by myself! What you need - toilet roll tubes, red paint, card (I used a cereal box), green paper, stickers and glitter glue. Paint the tubes, and leave to dry. Cut out Christmas tree shapes and stick to the card. Stick the trees to the rolls and then decorate with stickers and glitter glue to look like baubles and tinsel - Done! Leo was a bit bemused at first as the only painting we've done just involved splodging colours r...

I must apologise for bringing up the 'C word' so early.....Christmas is not actually that far away, but you probably knew that. I imagine that in the UK it's been everywhere you turn for weeks now? but here it's only the last week or so that I've seen or heard any mention of it. I'll soon be reading all the usual stuff online about Christmas stress and shopping in tweets and facebook statuses and be thankful that I'm out of it, don't get me wrong I LOVE Christmas but can't stand all the faffing about presents...  who everyone is or isn't buying for, how much it's costing etc etc I like to think that maybe people are going to worry less about it all with so many people now struggling for money but I'm probably being optimistic. This year, for the first time I'm doing home-made stuff, it may not be brilliant but it's the thought that counts and it's that or nothing!  I only be doing things for a very small amount of  peopl...

I'm slowly getting better at doing more craft activities with Leo. I always imagined I'd be doing all kinds of things but in reality it turned out to be harder than it looked! I've never been known for my patience and this is not helpful when it comes to dealing with toddlers at the best of times, let alone when you add paint, glue and instructions into the mix! I love the ideas over at Emma's Lunch, and the way the crafts are themed to the seasons so I thought I'd try an autumnal themed craft. My inital plan was to take Leo to the park, something we haven't done for a few months due to the heat, to collect some leaves, but I realised the flaw in the plan as soon as I looked out the window... the trees are all green and the few leaves that are around are the wrong type! Not to be outdone I printed some leaves to colour in, I gave Leo just 'autumnal colours' red, brown, yellow and orange, along with a green as he was a bit bemused that trees could...