Craft Review: Family Fun Magazine's Make Plastic Beads

The April 2011 edition of Family Fun Magazine has several great ideas... and we tried another today. My oldest and I made plastic beads from an empty water bottle. It was sort of a trial run to see if this project would be a good idea to do with the girls that will come to her 7th Birthday Party next month... about 8 of them from ages 4 to 9.

Items needed for this project: clean and dry plastic bottles (with thin, smooth plastic), permanent markers (we used Sharpies), cotton string, foil-lined baking sheet, store-bought beads, clear beading cord.

• Using a craft knife, cut the top and bottom sections from the bottle. Family Fun says that two-liter bottles and many used for vitamin waters and sports drinks are difficult to cut and roll. Then use scissors to cut the remaining cylinder into a rectangle.

• Cut the rectangle into 1/2 to 3/4 inch wide strips. Because of ridges in my bottles, my strips were a little more narrow. The instructions didn't specify how long the strips should be. I cut mine down to about two inches long.

• Draw with permanent markers on the inside of the curves strips. It can rub off if done on the outside. Be creative with colors and patterns.

• Roll each strip around a pen or pencil and tie your string around the strip to hold it together. You'll need one person to hold the bead and one to tie the string around it. Place tied strips on a foil-lined baking sheet.

• To set the beads, bake them at 300 degrees until the edges begin to soften, about 2 to 5 minutes. I put them in my toaster oven for 3 minutes. To see if they're done, carefully take one bead out and slip off the string. If it stays rolled up, then they're ready. When they have cooled, slip off the string and trim the ruffled ends.

• Make a bracelet or necklace by alternating homemade beads with store-bought beads on a length of clear elastic beading cord.

We found this project to be pretty easy, and she's excited to do it with her friends at her birthday party. I know in advance that we will need the extra sets of hands from the parents who will be in attendance, but usually our parties are a full family event anyway, so there will be enough hands to help out.

We give this project two thumbs up!


"But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be glory both now and forever! Amen." 2 Peter 3:18 

Craft Review: Family Fun Magazine's Paper Egg Diorama

With Easter around the corner, I thought I'd dig out an Easter craft my girls and I did a couple years ago. They were 2 and 4 at the time, and admittedly it was a bit too much for them at the time. My oldest stuck with me, but my youngest wasn't up to the task. I personally think it's a great activity for age 5 and up, depending on how much your kid likes to sit and do this kind of thing. If we did it again today, my oldest would be into it with gusto.

This idea is from Family Fun's April 2009 issue. I apologize that I do not have pictures of the process. To create a papier-mache' version of a panoramic sugar egg with a springtime scene tucked inside, you will need:

• Colored tissue paper
• White paper
• Balloon (small)
• Newspaper
• String
• Jar lid
• Small bowl
• 1/4 cup white flour
• 1/2 cup water
• Ribbon (20 inch length)
• Tape
• Items for interior

1. Cut the tissue paper and white paper into 1-1/2 to 2 inch squares. Inflate the balloon to the size you'd like your finished egg to be (ours are about 7 inches tall), then knot it. Cover your work area with newspaper. Either suspend the balloon over your work area (string from the ceiling?) or set the balloon on an upside down jar lid while you work (this is what we did). In a small bowl, stir the flour and water together to make papier-mache' paste. Working with one square at a time, dip the tissue paper into the paste and smooth it onto the balloon. Cover the entire balloon, making sure the squares overlap slightly. This will be the inner wall of the egg.

2. Using the same dip-and-smooth method, add TWO layers of white paper squares on top of the tissue paper, then add another final layer of tissue paper.

As you can imagine, because you are adding four layers of paper, this can become a time-consuming and monotonous task for the little ones.

3. When the egg is completely dry, use a pencil to mark a window opening on the side (an oval shaped large enough to reach inside and place your springtime scene), then cut it out with scissors. If you managed to avoid popping the balloon up to this point, pop it now and throw it away.

4. Next decorate the window. Dip tissue paper squares into the paste, crumple them into balls, and put them around the edge. (By this time, my older daughter was DONE... the younger one didn't make it past the first layer of tissue paper. I had some squares ready for this step, but we just never got around to it. While the egg was drying, my oldest went off to play and would check back frequently because she was ready to play with it. So once it was dry she didn't want to add the decoration, she just wanted to play with it. And the diorama looks okay without it... but if you have seen a sugar egg diorama, there would be frosting around the opening to make it decorative).

5. Tie the ribbon into a bow, tuck the knot into the hole left by the knot of the balloon, and secure the ribbon on the inside with tape. Decorate the egg's interior. (We used Easter grass and we made it a house for the girls' little feathery chicks). You can display the egg on an upside down jar lid.

So, overall it is a fun activity, but not for little ones. And if your older child has a short attention span for crafty activities, then I'd say you need to find a different activity, as this one takes some time and patience. 

I put our dioramas away with the Easter stuff the year we made them, so last year when I got them out, the girls were pretty excited to see them and play with them. And my oldest remembered there was supposed to be decoration around the edge of the window and asked about it. Maybe we'll add that this year.

"Everyone then who hears these words of mine [Jesus] and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock." Matthew 7:24

Craft Review: Family Fun Magazine's Paper Bag Nest

If you know me, you know that I love Family Fun, the magazine and the web site. It is the source of many of my ideas... of course that makes them not MY ideas. Today we tried out a craft idea from the latest issue of the magazine, the Paper Bag Nest. It's pretty simple. Gather a handful of twigs from the yard and break them into small pieces. Then squash the sides of a brown paper lunch bag. Pour a small puddle of tacky glue onto a paper plate, then dip each twig into the glue and stick it to the bag.

My girls enjoyed looking around the yard and gathering small twigs. Not a hard task in our yard and they gathered much more than we needed. We squashed our bags and began to glue... but I had regular Elmer's glue, and really not enough of it either. This made the project a little more difficult because Elmer's is not as thick a glue, and I really needed more than I had. So my 6-year-old became a bit frustrated with the project as her twigs were not co-operating with her.

After we finished putting on the twigs, we added some dried leaves that were still hanging around our yard, breaking them up and sticking them in between the twigs here and there to add fullness.

All in all, we enjoyed building our nests and talking about how birds go about making nests for themselves and the different materials they find to make them. And we learned that you really should have tacky glue for this project.

"But they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint." Isaiah 40:31