Popsicle Stick Christmas Tree

I know it's waaaaay too early for Christmas Crafts, but my daughter has been singing Christmas songs for months now so for us it's just about time.

I found this little craft on the Family Fun website. It's a cute little Christmas tree made out of popsicle sticks and sequins or any other little decorations you might have.

Supplies: Popsicle sticks, strong scissors, tacky glue/Elmer's glue, sequins, and/or pom-poms.

You'll need one thick popsicle stick and a few of the thinner ones. Start by cutting the the thinner popsicle sticks to different lengths to make 5 - 6 branches for the tree.

Family Fun says to use tacky glue to put the pieces together. Being the novice crafter that I am, I have no idea what tacky glue is. (I made a note to google it later). We tried to use a glue stick. That was a big fail. So I brought out my handy dandy glue gun (love that thing) and quickly assembled the tree.

Once you've got the tree put together, let your kid paint or color the tree with markers (preferably washable markers, lesson learned).

Then glue some fun decorations on the tree. For this we used good old Elmer's glue. While you're at it, be sure to check your horoscope to see how the rest of your day will turn out. ;)

And there it is! A butterfly Christmas tree! Nice job, Finley!

Fun with Oobleck

Who doesn't love Oobleck? I remember my mom making this for us growing up. I have vague recollections of her making us play with it outside though. And I can see why. It can get a bit messy.

The best thing about this is you probably have these ingredients in your pantry already: cornstarch, water, and food coloring (totally optional, but ooey gooey stuff is way more fun when it's green, isn't it?)

The mixture is 1 part water to 1 1/2 - 2 parts cornstarch, plus food coloring. Start with the cornstarch and then begin adding the water until you get the right consistency. I had a hard time mixing the food coloring into the cornstarch/water mixture after it became a glob of goo. (There were bits of green that didn't get mixed in so Finley was left with Shrek hands afterwards. Ooops! Next time I'll mix the food coloring into a bit of water first.)

Finley had fun right from the beginning. She helped me mix it all together.

And it wouldn't be craft time without a little mischief from the boy. He has this habit of getting his head stuck in the back the chair. Then he yells out "Maaaammmmaaaa! I stuck!" I swear he says "I stuck" 50 times a day. If you look closely you can see that Finley is being a typical big sis and adding a bit of insult to his injury. Don't worry, I helped him out of this mess (after snapping a few pics first!).

We both had so much fun playing with this stuff. Finley loved drizzling the slime on my hands. If I closed my eyes I could almost pretend I was at the salon getting a paraffin dip. Almost, but not quite.