Clay Ornaments Using Stamps and Star Anise

 

Now that all the parents have probably opened their holiday gifts from the children, I can blog about their ornaments.  We are very lucky because we have access to a kiln, which my husband so kindly fires for us.  So, for our ornaments the children were able to work with clay, which I find stimulates the children to no end.  It is interesting because the children play with play- dough and gak all the time, but they have a different approach with clay.  They naturally know that clay has many more possibilities for exploration.

 

 The children first roll out their pieces of clay on a small piece of canvas to help it from sticking to the table.  We use low fire white clay.

We have been talking about adding texture to things, so the children

added some textures to their clay by using stamps and rollers.

 

 

From there, they simply cut out their shapes with cookie cutters.

 

The ornaments waiting to dry and go into the kiln.

 

On another day, I wanted to add a sensory experience to the ornament making.

The smell of anise always makes me think of Christmas.  My mother to this day makes amazing anisette cookies.  I went to our local health food store and picked up some star anise for a recipe, and realized the children would love these.  So, I had the children explore their star shape and smell the spicy, familiar scent of my childhood.

 

They loved the smell of the anise, but more impressive was stamping with the star anise in our ornaments.  They left a beautiful impression.

 

Here are several star anise ornaments after the firing.

 

For the finishing touch, the children used metallic acrylic paints instead of

glazes on their ornament.

 

 

 

Winter Deer Card

For Holiday cards this year the children made these Winter Deer Paintings

that I fell in love with.  They simply placed a deer sticker ( a foam sticker works best) on water color paper cards.

They wet their cards with water first and then did wet on wet water color painting on and around the deer.

 

Before they dried they sprinkled salt all over the cards and we left them to dry.

I think the reason the cards came out so great is because they piled lots of salt on, they had a ball "making it snow!"

I let the salt set for a while, then scraped it off with a spatula over the garbage.

Here are some more pictures of some of the cards made.  They were all very beautiful.

They had the choice to take the sticker off or leave them on.  Some liked the way the cards looked with the sticker on, and others liked seeing the negative space the sticker left on the card.

Later I wrote in messages the kids wanted me to write in the cards.

Photo Transfer Snow Globes

One of our Holiday gifts and projects were photo transfer snow globes.

I love doing photo transfers with the children.  It is an easy tactile project that has a beautiful end result.  This year I wanted to try it out as a snow globe. 



The first part of this project is photocopying a picture.  Typically printed pictures do not work, the ink just runs when placed in water so I recommend going to print shop and xeroxing the pictures.

I then place clear contact paper over the picture and cut them out for the children.



This is a simple process, the children take a rock and run it all over the contact paper.

This helps the ink the stick to the contact paper better.

They then place the image into a bowl of water and let it soak through the paper.

Then we place towels on the table and the children work on rubbing off the paper with their fingers.

once it gets a little tough, just place it in the water again, take out and rub the paper some more.

There is a magic to this process because all of a sudden they start to see their faces below the surface of the paper.

After the paper is completely rubbed off, the images were still a bit tacky, so the children were able to place their images onto the containers.  We secured them with a little tape and brought them over to the light table to be filled with water, glitter, water beads, and  little trees and snow flake glitter flakes.

I think they came out great, and although the snow globe effect didn't work out quite how I wanted them to, they do make for a nice sensory experience for the children to shake and turn upside down.  The reverse side almost magnifies itself in the water, and looks neat with the glitter floating in front of it.

Candle Making

 

We attended a Yuletide Festival this December and one of the things that my daughter and I enjoyed the most was the candle making.  I thought it was so beautiful watching the children walk slowly around a table and dipping sticks with wicks tied on them into beeswax and then cold water.  They continued this rhythm until they had a wonderful candle.

 

I of course got home and couldn't wait to do it with my older kids on Tuesdays and after school.

 

 

Fortunately, I had all the materials.  I am regularly given  coffee tins which I used in a pot of hot water as a double boiler.  I first melted down the wax in a larger tin and pot on the stove top, and then transferred the wax into a smaller, taller tin and pot of water that I kept on the warm setting on the hot plate.

 

 

As the children walked around our table, they dipped their wicks into the wax, let it drip, then dabbed it onto a piece of wax paper.  They then walked over to the cold water and dipped the candle into the water.

 

As the children walked around we played some Holiday music.

We did this project on two different occasions.  The first was during one of the days of Hanukkah and we talked about honoring the light and the mitzvah of Hanukkah.

The second time we did this project in the afternoon with a small group, this particular day was the day before Winter Solstice and we discussed that we were approaching the shortest day of the year, and that we are bringing our own light into the world through making our candles.

Both felt like a sweet way to honor the concept of light and the importance of it in our lives.

 

 

It was very exciting for the kids to see their candles grow each time they walked around the table.

We had a wonderful time enjoying the simple process and ease of making these candles.

One student used her candle on her Daddy's birthday cake, how sweet!

Here are some of our candles.

Some Holiday Crafts

These three projects are simple projects to do if you are looking for something fun, as well as something that will keep toddlers interested and happy.  At school I try to do a lot of experimenting with art materials where they don't have to have a finished project, yet sometimes they love walking out the door with something to show their parents.  These first two projects came from Family Fun, and they are just that.  The last project is a simple paper chain.

Glowing Snow People:

You will need recycled water bottles or other plastic bottles, white tissue paper (we used recycle tissue paper from a present which we cut up into small pieces...this gave us the opportunity to talk about reusing items), google eyes, felt for the hat, a battery operated tea light, and watered down glue.

Prior to giving the children the bottles I cut holes in the bottom of the bottle a little bit smaller than the tea lights, so that after pushing them into the bottle they do not fall out.

• Start by painting the glue mixture on the bottle. 

I love the look on his face!

• Next, start adding the tissue paper all around the bottle
  

•  Add eyes, and black felt around the bottle top for the hat, if you have the actual bottle top you can just paint it black.  For the mouth and nose I found it easier and more expressive to have the children draw them on. oh, and of course glue on some felt circles for buttons.

I love the personality these Snow People have.

Popsicle Tree:

• Have the children color in their Popsicle sticks with green marker, or if they wish to chose another color, that also looks great .  It helped to have different length pop cycles. 
• Have them glue down the popsicles in the fashion of a tree.
• Then have them glue embellishments on as ornaments.

Paper Chains:

I think everyone knows how to make a paper chain, but the trick to making a nice one is to have beautiful paper.  This paper was from my paper collection, and instead of having it sit in the drawer, I decided it should be showed off.

One quick tip, I found that glue sticks work best with this age group because it sticks rather quickly and is easier to handle.