Welcome to stART! I hope that you will enjoy our story and art project and maybe even share your own too. All I ask is that you link back to A Mommy’s Adventures somewhere in your post by either adding my button or a text link, so that others can see all the other great projects that everyone shares too! The linky will be open all week. Be sure to stop by and visit the different links…every week there are so many different and fun book and craft ideas!
Check out the stART tab in my navigation bar where you can find our past stART projects. All the books that we have read and did a stART project for are listed in alphabetical order. I have also included a list of all the blogs that participate in stART.
We read What Is Easter?, by Michelle Medlock Adams last year and really enjoyed it again this year. I love how it talks about all the fun things that kids enjoy doing for Easter, like going on Easter Egg Hunts, getting Easter candy, but then explains what Easter is really about!
This year I read this book to my Sunday School class, and it captured their attention the whole time I was reading it. Each page asks a question like,“Is Easter all about Jelly Beans and Chocolate bunnies?” and they would shout “NO!!!” It was so much fun to read to them.
The last page is my favorite part of this book:
Okay, now I get it.
The Easter Bunny is okay,
And Easter eggs are fun.
But Easter's not about that stuff.
It's all about God's son.
I read the last line slowly and by the time I got to “It’s all about…” they finished the last line for me. Even though this is a board book a group of 2 year olds to 10 year olds loved it!
To go with this book Emily and Juliette made marbled crosses. When I think of Easter my favorite tradition is the Living Cross that my church creates on Easter Sunday. Every person in the congregation gets a fresh flower to stick into a huge cross that is covered in chicken wire. Once we are finished, a dull wooden cross is blooming with new life! Our marbled crosses reminded me of the beautiful colors of the Living Cross we make on Easter Sunday!
Unfortunately, I was not able to get pictures of the girls working on this project. My nephew work up from his nap early and did not want to be put down. So I had him in one arm and was helping them with the other. No extra hands to take pictures :(
It was still very easy to do. We sprayed some shaving cream into a layer onto a baking sheet. Then the girls used droppers to add drops of liquid watercolors on top of the shaving cream. Next they used a craft stick to mix the colors into the shaving cream. But, just a little bit, so that you can still see the individual colors. Then they took the paper that I cut out in the shape of a cross and gently pressed it onto the shaving cream after a few seconds they pulled it up and used the craft stick to wipe off the extra shaving cream, this is the best part because it looks all white and plain and as you pull the craft stick down and the shaving cream comes of of the paper the vibrant swirls off color are revealed.
Thing we learned while doing this:
Make sure you do not saturate the shaving cream. The more shaving cream you use, the more paint you can use. If you add to much paint the colors blend together and the liquid dissolves the shaving cream.
Do not mix to much, you just want to use the craft stick to swirl the colors around not mix them all together.
Have fun, and be sure to have an extra can of shaving cream the girls were really disappointed when we ran out!!!
Welcome to stART! I hope that you will enjoy our story and art project and maybe even share your own too. All I ask is that you link back to A Mommy’s Adventures somewhere in your post by either adding my button or a text link, so that others can see all the other great projects that everyone shares too! The linky will be open all week. Be sure to stop by and visit the different links…every week there are so many different and fun book and craft ideas!
Check out the stART tab in my navigation bar where you can find our past stART projects. All the books that we have read and did a stART project for are listed in alphabetical order. I have also included a list of all the blogs that participate in stART.
This week we enjoyed reading Minerva Louise and the Colorful Eggs, by Janet Morgan Stoeke. In this story, Minerva finds an Easter Basket that she thinks is a hat for her to wear. When she puts it on she notices an egg inside of it. Minerva Louise does not want the egg to be cold so she sits on it to warm it with her fluffy feathers. As she is looking for the egg’s mother she notices another egg and then another egg. Soon she decided to tell her friends what is going on, when they come out all the eggs are gone. They look for answers however the Chocolate Easter Bunny and Marshmallow Chicks are no help! Finally they find one last colorful egg that is quickly snatched up by a little hand. The other hens felt better that the “farmers” were doing a good job taking care of the eggs and left, but Minerva Louise, found a nice full Easer Basket for her nest.
The girls loved this book and especially how silly Minerva Louise is! To go along with this book we made some of our own colorful eggs. When I saw the idea to use jell-o powder with glue like on Pinterest I knew that we had to try it and that it would work perfectly with this book.
I cut out egg shapes for each of the girls and placed them on a cookie sheet. I also poured the powdered jell-o mix into egg coloring cups, that I saved from last year, in corresponding colors. 
Welcome to stART! I hope that you will enjoy our story and art project and maybe even share your own too. All I ask is that you link back to A Mommy’s Adventures somewhere in your post by either adding my button or a text link, so that others can see all the other great projects that everyone shares too! The linky will be open all week. Be sure to stop by and visit the different links…every week there are so many different and fun book and craft ideas!
Check out the stART tab in my navigation bar where you can find our past stART projects. All the books that we have read and did a stART project for are listed in alphabetical order. I have also included a list of all the blogs that participate in stART.
To go along with this book I set up a project for Emily to do when she came home from school. I love Eric Carle’s illustrations so we made ducks in the ocean inspired by the cover of this book.
I gave the girls a duck template (click on the picture above for a free download) that I drew on a piece of construction paper.
First they glued on pieces of yellow tissue paper for the body and orange tissue paper for the beaks.
When they were finished the glued on a blue wiggly eye.
For the water Juliette decided to finger paint the piece of paper. I gave them a few different shades of blue and some green to make it look like the picture on the cover.
Emily used the same colors, but she decided she wanted to use a brush.
When everything was dry the girls glued their ducks onto the water backgrounds.
Juliette loved this project and was so proud of it, she asked if she could hang it in her room when it was ready!
I love giving the girls alternate canvases to work on. It is a great way to have them think out of the box and use materials in different ways.
Balloons and Stickers are two things that almost every child loves so for this open ended art project I put the two together and the girls had so much fun with it.
The little kids (21 months – 2.5 years) placed the stickers all over the balloons. 
After they finished their creations it was fun to use the decorated balloons to play keep it up. They tap the balloon trying to keep it from touching the ground. It was interesting to feel the difference between a plain balloon and one that is covered in stickers!
I originally saw the idea for this Splatter Painting project on Pinterest, from Teach Preschool and knew that I had to try it out with our Art Group.
To set up this project I put a piece of paper inside each baking tray and put three rubber bands around each tray. I started by painting the rubber bands with the paint then the girls snapped them to make the paint splatter all over the paper, but very quickly the girls wanted to add the paint on their own to do it again and again and again.
Emily loved snapping the rubber bands and even used both hands to do two at a time. They experimented with moving the rubber bands around on the tray and even sliding the paper out and around the other way to mix the colors.
All the kids from 21 months to 5 years old loved this activity, except Juliette who was in a mood! Oh well maybe next time :)
Welcome to stART! I hope that you will enjoy our story and art project and maybe even share your own too. All I ask is that you link back to A Mommy’s Adventures somewhere in your post by either adding my button or a text link, so that others can see all the other great projects that everyone shares too! The linky will be open all week. Be sure to stop by and visit the different links…every week there are so many different and fun book and craft ideas!
Check out the stART tab in my navigation bar where you can find our past stART projects. All the books that we have read and did a stART project for are listed in alphabetical order. I have also included a list of all the blogs that participate in stART.
This week we read Lucky Tucker, by Leslie McGuirk. This is a cute book about a dog named Tucker who is not having a very good day, until he rolls around in a four-leaf clover patch that belongs to a leprechaun!
To go along with this book the girls made shamrock collages. I gave them a piece of card stock in the shape of a shamrock and then set out markers, do a dot markers and all sorts of green collage materials like pipe cleaners, wiggly eyes, feathers, stickers straws, velcro, ribbon, pom poms for them to get creative with.
Coloring with the green markers
Emily decided to use the green wiggly eyes to turn it into a Shamrock Person
Juliette took a picture of her Shamrock collage when she was all finished.
The girl’s Shamrock Collages, I love how different they are and how they each used the same materials in their own unique way!
Emily’s Shamrock
(5 years old)
Juliette’s Shamrock
(2.5 years old)
Welcome to stART! I hope that you will enjoy our story and art project and maybe even share your own too. All I ask is that you link back to A Mommy’s Adventures somewhere in your post by either adding my button or a text link, so that others can see all the other great projects that everyone shares too! The linky will be open all week. Be sure to stop by and visit the different links…every week there are so many different and fun book and craft ideas!
Check out the stART tab in my navigation bar where you can find our past stART projects. All the books that we have read and did a stART project for are listed in alphabetical order. I have also included a list of all the blogs that participate in stART.
I love the book Not a Box, by Antoinette Portis! I love how it inspires children be able to use their imaginations and creativity to do or be anything that they want. The simple line drawings are perfect for the suspense of the story. We love guessing what his box is and what he will do next. One thing is for sure, this is NOT a box!
To go along with Not a Box we got creative with two large boxes that I had. Pushed the table out of the way and put down a table cloth. Then I gave them paint, stamps , foam rollers and paint brushes and let them create to their hearts content.
This was one of the best projects we have ever done, I think they would have painted all day if we had more boxes.
Clean up was CRAZY but totally worth it, here are a few pictures to give you an idea of what the house looked like afterwards :)
