Letter U - Umbrella and Universe with Coffee Filters (and the Earth)

UMBRELLAS, UNIVERSE AND THE EARTH

This was a tough week....letter U...Umbrella, Under, Underwear, Unicorn, Universe....

I had an idea of making some umbrellas but my daughter preferred the Universe....until I told her that in order to make the umbrellas, we had to make it rain....hum, that's mysterious??? How???

Here's how:

First you need this template (download it by clicking on the image)

Then you need:

• Coffee Filters
• Water
• Scissors and Glue
• Markers

Umbrella

Print the template and cut the umbrellas. Don't color them.

Color the coffee filter with markers. Just scribble scrabble...

These are the ones we made. (the blue one is for the Universe activity. You also need a green one if you want to make the Earth activity...)

Put the umbrellas on a surface and put on top the colored coffee filter....
LET IT RAIN!!!!

She had so much fun!

Wait until it dries and look at your umbrellas now...now they are colored!

Since I was trying new techniques, we used food coloring to paint the background. You just need one drop and some water! I am definitely using this technique again!

With regular paint and a Q-tip, we made some rain drops...oh, and the clouds are made of cotton balls

We need the umbrellas with this rain!

Done! U is for Umbrella!

Universe

Put the blue coffee filter on a blank paper (this one had a little blue on the background since I was trying the food coloring paint) and let it rain!

Wait until it is dry. We used this coloring page of the planets (kaboose website) and my daughter used watercolors to color them. She cut them out and glued them...this is our Universe

The Earth

I know this has nothing to do with the letter U, but it is still Earth Day Month, and we have to recycle, so instead of trowing the colored coffee filters away, we made a nice craft with it.

I don't have a picture of the green coffee filter but you do the same...just scribble scrabble a little bit green and make it wet. After it is dry, you cut it in little pieces and glue it on the blue one, making the continents. Here is the Earth. It is so easy to do, and you see the different blues and greens, just like in our real World!

Recycled Nature Box and Carton Wallet - Earth Day Activities

April 22 is Earth Day and we need to encourage our kids (and remind ourselves) that this is the only place we have to live on and that it is going to be for ourselves, our children and grandchildren. We have to take care of the planet, today and everyday.

At school my daughter has learned a lot about recycling, and now she knows what belongs in the recycling bin and what not. For her Show and Tell, we made 2 things. First, something made with recycling material and something related to the Earth. Second, an activity I saw on Family Fun.

RECYCLED NATURE BOX

I first saw this activity here and thought it was a great idea since we could use recycling material while having a nice walk outside and enjoy our planet...our planet is so colorfull...sometimes we forget it!

First we painted the egg carton with colors. (Ours was clear plastic)

My daughter looked everywhere and we found a lot of items that matched the colors inside the box! She was so proud when she filled all the colors!

We had:

• Yellow, green and orange leaves.
• Purple, yellow, pink, orange and red flowers
• Blue, gray, white rocks
• Green rosemary...that smells so good!
• Brown dried coconut husk, stones and wood

I found this activity on Coastal Girl' s blog and she has a lot of nice ideas and activities!

CARTON WALLET

I found this great craft on Family Fun yesterday and since it was Earth Day, we decided we had to do it.

It's an activity for older children, but I made it, and my daughter drew something nice so she could give it to her teacher as a present. You only need a juice or milk carton, scissors and the template

Hope you had a wonderful Earth Day!

Letter U - Under the Sea Tank- (Recycle Earth Day)

I was not sure if it was letter T week again or the letter U...

My daughter's teacher told me they would continue last week's activities about the Ocean, about Earth Day and that they would go on a field trip to the beach and do some research and snorkeling, so we came up with this

Under the Sea Fish Tank made with Recycled Materials to celebrate Earth Day!

(This is another variant of the Kijkdoos I explained last week...)

Working together was so much fun and this project was so easy to do!
All this was made with stuff I had at home....look at the details...

• A shoebox...
• This pattern I created and I want to share with you for download and use.

NOTE:

You can download this template and use it anytime, but please don't copy it anywhere else without my permission. I worked on it and a simple link to this page would be a great way to share it. Thanks!!!

The Top Sign was made with the back of the shoebox. I cut a piece of the box before placing the blue tissue paper so the light would come trough. We glued 2 Goldfish crackers and my daughter wrote the word TANK.

The Red Crab is made with Farfalle Pasta (Bow Tie pasta) and red paint. Glued some eyes and done.

And the Sea Stars with Stelline Pasta.

The Sea Algae (Seaweed) was made with Raffia.

In the corner you can see some Corn Kernels. These are our Sea Plants!

The Rocks are little stones from our backyard.

Glitter gives the water a bubbling effect.

The Sea Shells are Cavatelli Pasta and the Coral Reef are pieces of Walnut


After we places everything inside the box, I used some thread to hang the fish.

Are you ready to go Scuba diving???

We used these real cool markers called Elmer's Kids Arts and Crafts Paintastics Color Changing Markers
A great way to draw and create with no mess. These paint brush pens feature vivid, true color paint right in the brush, so there is no need for jars, water or separate brushes. The washable paint in the pens dries instantly for less smudging.

These color changing pens paint in one color, then can be changed to two more colors by using the color Magic Wand.

Simply rub the Magic Pen over the other 5 pens to produce instant color changes. Each pen can produce 3 different colors!

The Letter T - Train Station and more...all in a kind of "Television Box"

This week we made a "Kijkdoos" (show box or diorama).

I grew up in The Netherlands, and I remember making these boxes with all kind of themes...and it was so much fun! And so simple to do!

This time we made 2 boxes. The first one was a Train Station, and the second one was just full of objects that starts with the letter T.

Train Station

Here is how I made this one.

All you need is:

• A shoe box (the ones with a hole in front are the best)
• Tissue paper
• Glue
• Scissors
• My Train Template you can download here...Free!

I will draw more templates in the future! Hope you like it!

NOTE: You can download this template and use it anytime, but please don't copy it anywhere else without my permission. I worked on it and a simple link to this page would be a great way to share it. Thanks!!!

Step by Step:

Print the Template and let your child color and cut it.

Decorate the inside of the box as you wish. You can use anything, paint, stickers, etc. We used Tissue paper. It gives a colorful and nice effect.

Then glue the cutouts inside the box. You can back them with cardboard if they are too thin to stand by themselves. Remember to fold the paper and put only glue on the bottom.

Another important step is to work from back to front. Place the largest cutouts in the back and the smallest in the front. Since our box was too narrow, we decided to put the train on a wall...it didn't fit in the back where I thought would look good...anyway...

This is how it will look like...

Open some windows on the lid of the box. You get the best effect if you make two rectangulars, one in front and one back. But we made also the letter T to reinforce the letter of the week.

Glue some tissue paper inside the lid and close the box.

...and take a close look!!!!

For the Letter T Objects Box.

Let your child look for little objects that start with the letter T and glue them or use tape to place them in the box.

We found:

• Telephone
• Train
• Tape
• Tomato
• Tiger
• Teaspoon
• Turquese Crayon
• Turttles
• Teddybear
• Triangle

This box has a flying Tiger inside...left...

Center...

Right...

My daughter found this so funny....

Have fun making yours! You can create so many nice boxes!!!!