The cheese-on-a-stick trick

When I asked my seven-year-old, 'What could we make this cardboard cheese packaging into?' I was not surprised, when he cheekily replied, 'I don't know. Cheese, maybe?' I took his offhand comment as an indication that my hint-y craft-prompt was not going to fly on this occasion. I was on my way to put the packaging into the recycling box when Bud stopped me - and said, ' No, mummy. I really want to make that thing into some cheese.'

With that, he took the box (which I'd flipped inside out) and announced that it needed to be coloured yellow. He used a painting pen for this and soon it really did resemble a block of cheese. He even added a flap of paper to the edge that didn't have a side - which he measured, coloured, cut and stuck on with a glue stick.

It was this flap I think, which gave him the idea that the cheese could have something hidden inside it; something that could pop out. Now, who or what could be hiding in a cheese? Why a mouse of course! I knew all those Tom and Jerry cartoons weren't a waste of time.

We found our cute finger puppet mouse - he fit perfectly - and Bud worked out that we'd need something to make him pop out. So, we attached the mouse to a thin wooden stick (with a little sticky tape) and hid him inside the cheese. Ta - dah!

I really loved Bud's interest in making something using paper, paint and glue - he usually reserves that confidence and enthusiasm for Lego creations. Here are Buddy and Daisy to demonstrate how it works.

This trick has sparked-off other ideas for pop-ups we could make - we do have a lot of finger puppets. So far, they've come up with their mermaid puppet swimming out from a big shell, mini-monkey jumping out from a banana, and little Tinkerbell flying out from a flower. I don't know if we'll ever get round to making these other pop-up puppets - but it's been such fun chatting about it. And in the meantime, we're still loving Buddy's cheese-on-a-stick trick.

Sam's Snowflake

I was back at the Geffrye Museum on Saturday leading the Christmas Nursery Rhyme Time sessions. The Museum is a perfect setting for festive fun as it currently tells the story of how London families have prepared for everything from Twelfth Night and New Year, to the winter solstice and Christmas over the last four centuries. The BBC has put up a slide show that gives a flavour of the Museum at this time of year: Celebrating the best of Christmas past.

In my sessions I adapted a children's story by Gillian Shields and retold it using props, actions, songs and craft. The children, aged between two and six, joined in enthusiastically and I was impressed with how their grown ups participated too.

In the story we helped Sam and his mother get ready for Christmas while they waited for his father to return from the forest with a surprise; he'd promised to get home before the snow.

Sam and his mother did their Christmas baking; making cakes, pies and biscuits flavoured with cinnamon and nutmeg (we passed round spice samples for everyone to smell). They brought out their boxes of decorations and guessed what was within the packaging before revealing the contents (we used feely bags with vintage decorations from the handling collection for this).

All the while Sam kept wondering how long it would be before his father came home - and where was the snow? Sam's mother distracted him by showing him how to make a rainbow snowflake decoration using glittery pipe cleaners and pony beads (everyone used their twisting and threading skills here). The rainbow snowflake gave Sam an idea...

Maybe the snow had lost its way! He decided to make a glittery snowflake that would shine out of his bedroom window to guide his dad and the snow home in time for Christmas. He used a sheet of white paper, scissors to cut, fingers to fold and rip, and glue to cover it with sparkly glitter. Then he attached a little wooden stick to the back so he could prop it against his window pane. The children watched avidly as I showed them how Sam did all this.

The story ended with Sam's father returning from the forest with a Christmas tree, as it began to snow once more. Sam's snowflake landed magically at the top of the tree, where it shone and glittered like a star.

Everyone made a rainbow snowflake (candy canes, wreaths and even a spacecraft were created too), and then whole families sat on the floor together surrounded by paper, glitter and glue, making their own snowflakes on sticks; all unique - just like the real thing. It was magical.

Ice magic

Today I stayed at home with my five year old; he's been coughing and spluttering all over the place. He's accepted cuddles, warm drinks and listened to several audio books but I know how awful he's feeling because even the new snow hasn't tempted him outside. Instead we made these crystal icicles which I hung on a snowy branch in our garden. They've been spinning and glittering in the icy wind, catching the light and the attention of my poorly boy. 

You'll need:

transparent plastic food packaging

scissors

clear glue

granulated sugar

silver glitter

a hole punch

white cotton thread

1. Cut the plastic packaging into icicles and crystals

2. Punch a hole in the top of each shape

3. Use clear wet glue to make icy patterns just where you like

4. Sprinkle granulated sugar and silver glitter over the glue

5. Thread a doubled length of white cotton through its hole and pass the ends through the loop

6. Knot the ends of the thread and hang on a branch of a tree or bush

Of course, they are impossible to photograph, but I do recommend you make some. They have certainly added sparkle, movement and magic to our winter garden today.

O Christmas tree

And so the countdown to Christmas begins...

We have an Advent candle, a calendar, and a beautiful mini wooden Christmas tree to decorate with little baubles, one for each day of Advent. I know this sounds like a lot, but the excitement of sorting out who is going to open the even numbered windows of the calendar, and who is to decorate the tree on odd numbered days has been fabulous; it doesn't seem over-the-top at all just now.

Daisy was inspired by the wooden Advent tree and decided to make her own. Using it as a template she drew round its outline on thin card and then used watercolour to paint it green. I helped with the cutting out after this.

Much glue and glitter later, the tree was resplendent, baubles and a star adorning its branches. We slotted the two sections together to give the 3d effect and added a small piece of toilet roll cardboard as a sturdy base.

We loved using our new glitter shakers again - you can just see them in the photos. Buddy and Daisy can sparkle-up all manner of items independently with these. Glitter is great any time of year but it's just about essential during the winter festivities. I expect to get much more use out those little shakers over the next month.

Night and day

We love Phyllis Root's Lucia and the Light. It's a great choice for a bedtime story as the nights draw in. It's got it all; snowy Norwegian mountains, dark versus light, warmth versus cold, good versus evil. And trolls. Brilliant.

At the Geffrye Museum today, I told my own version of this folk tale during two very busy Nursery Rhyme Time sessions. To help bring it to life I used candles, lamps, a warm white cat (a furry hot water bottle), a winter hat, mittens, boots, a tinderbox and a glittering ball as the sun. The children - all five years old or under - played their part too, with enthusiastic participation; hugging the cat, joining in with the story's actions and songs, getting properly scared by the trolls, and cheering on Lucia in her quest to find the long-lost sun.

Then we explored light, transparency and translucency further - and got well and truly gluey - making these sweet carry-home tea-light lamps from empty water bottle bases. We offered pieces of colourful cellophane, punchinella, Halloween sequins, LED tea-lights and plenty of PVA, and then let the children do the rest.

The water bottles were prepared before the sessions; their bases were trimmed and hole-punched, ribbons tied and then put inside out of the way so as not to get too gluey.

As ever, Buddy and Daisy helped me test out the activity beforehand. Here, Daisy is exploring the semi-transparency of cellophane. Buddy is not convinced.

Daisy quite liked getting gluey and got stuck in straight away but Buddy played around with a car for a long time before actually sticking anything on his bottle. However, both were motivated to finish their lamps when I showed them the twinkling LED tea-lights that would sit inside them.

In the museum sessions we gave each child a drawing of a mountain scene to colour, to reflect both their favourite part of Lucia's story and Mary Grandpre's beautiful illustrations. Buddy and Daisy tried this too; though Buddy needed lots of help getting started. I gave them chalk pastels and showed them how they could blur and mix them on the paper to create different effects. When Buddy realised it could be messy and smudgy - he had a go, enjoying the sensation of spreading colour with this fingers.

Daisy's gorgeous pink and golden dawn contrasts superbly with Buddy's darkly purple and blue night time - and it didn't surprise me at all that they chose to illustrate opposing parts of the story. Nor that Buddy needed lots of encouragement to put pastel to paper. They are themselves as different as night and day.

And of course I wouldn't have them any other way.

Make it snappy

Last Saturday morning over breakfast, a rather raucous family game evolved; we took turns being wild animals while everyone else guessed what we were. Daisy's angry monkey, Buddy's vicious shark and daddy's sleepy sloth made us laugh so much that cereal nearly came out of our noses. When my turn came, I stretched my arms out like snappy jaws and everyone guessed straight away; a crocodile, of course - too easy.

Crocodiles featured again this week; Bud and Daisy watched Disney's Peter Pan - they love the crocodile-chasing-Hook-at-ludicrous-speed-across-the-sea sequence, and we've been enjoying our favourite crocodile books; Melrose and Croc and The Star-faced Crocodile, pictured below.

The crocodiles in both stories are so soft nurture it's easy to forget the nature of the real deal - until you meet SNAPPY-CROC (top picture) made by Buddy and Daisy with a little help from mummy.

Here's how we made him:

To make his eyes, nostrils and teeth, we glued pieces from two egg boxes onto thick, folded cardboard (ours was packaging from a new bed sheet).

Each tooth-triangle was folded about 5mm from its base and stuck to the perimeter of the card with a glue-stick. Later, I added a strip of masking tape to his whole dental region, just to secure the odd wobbly tooth.

We trimmed his back teeth to make them extra 'sharp' and to enable that long jaw to close.

Once dry, we painted him to the children's specification; red inside, green outside and he had to have yellow eyes. I mixed in a fair bit of PVA glue in the hope of preventing the paint peeling off (too reptilian).

Et voila!

SNAPPY-CROC has been a huge success. He's certainly seen a lot of action; he lost a tooth in a particularly violent tussle with Nan, and he's been the reason for much of the recent laughter, shrieking and running around in our house. Not bad going for a bit of old cardboard rescued from the recycling box.