play

Setting Up Shop

by Stacy on November 18, 2009

KSW_Eat_Local

Looking for some fun activities to keep your little ones busy this Thanksgiving Holiday? We’ll be featuring some fun for everyone ideas to keep the wee ones occupied and get them excited about Thanksgiving at the same time!

Our first activity is setting up a pretend grocery store ~ talk about Eating Local! The only limit is your imagination and if you’re a recycler, than chances are you have everything you need in your recycling bins {Empty juice bottles, cereal boxes or any boxes for that mater, yogurt or butter containers, etc}. Anything your kids will have fun sorting, stacking, and putting in their carts.

If you have toys or toy bins with wheels (dump trucks, strollers, toy boxes, etc) use these as makeshift shopping carts. Give your kids a few reusable shopping bags for toting their goods after they pay.

I taught my kids to pick out the items they wanted and wheel them to the checkout ( 2 x Ikea Lack Tables and a fisher price piano). Next, we emptied the shopping carts, scanned all the items (complete with beeping sound and everything) and packed them into the shopping bags. We used junk mail as our currency but given more time, I’ll probably make some life like versions out of felt.

The kids had a blast with this activity and the best part was watching them interact with one another with no adult participation. Anytime there’s a chance to see the world through the eyes of a child, I encourage you to stop and take a moment to enjoy it. More than likely, you will learn something yourself.

Note: Children will vary, but this activity provided 45 minutes of pure entertainment for my 2 & 3 year old. This activity inspired from the Bo’s November curriculum Yr II from Itty Bitty Bookworm (more on this amazing resource coming soon)

{ 0 comments }

Sea Inspired DIY Costumes

by Stacy on October 21, 2009

family_fun_mermaid_costume

I’m super impressed with the new addition to Family Fun‘s DIY Halloween costumes this year. These adroable beauties look like something you spent a ton of money on and they’re both easy enough for beginners that I feel confident even I could make them look great. My kids costumes are already planned this year, but I have a feeling that mermaid look will be making its way into play time in my house VERY SOON. {It’s made using cupcake liners!}

family_fun_jellyfish

Mermaid instructions
Jellyfish Details

Don’t forget to peruse the rest of the KSW DIY Halloween Round-Up

{ Comments on this entry are closed }

5 Fun for FREE Activities

by Stacy on June 2, 2009

Five fun, FREE activities to try with your kids … more ideas coming soon …

1. Let ‘er rip, tear, and cut
Children LOVE the shredding sound paper makes, the feel of crinkling pages between their fingers, and the act of cutting from old magazines. Put your old magazines to good use while providing hours of fun for your toddlers.

Age Appropriate: 6 months & up ~ Shredding & tearing for younger children, save the cutting for 2 & up

2. Flashlight games
Turn off the lights, close the blinds, grab a flashlight, and lie back on the floor for a rockin’ light show with your little ones. Dance the light beam along the ceiling and walls, babies will stare in delight while toddlers giggle with glee. On rainy days try a game of flashlight tag or shadow puppets to burn off some of that toddler energy.

Age Appropriate: 3 months & up

3. It’s a plane!
Check with your local airport to see whether it has an observation tower – or a room with huge windows where your toddler can watch planes take off and land. Bring along some lunch and enjoy the show.

Age Appropriate: 2 & up

4. Bathing in the pink
Or the green, or the blue… A few drops of food coloring go a long way toward making bath time something special. It’s especially fun to mix colors together, to make special shades like purple, turquoise, or orange. Don’t worry, a few drops of food coloring diluted in a tub of water won’t dye your child’s skin.

Age Appropriate: 2 & up

5. Camp in
Wait for a dark and dreary day. Now suggest that you go camping – in your family room. Make a “tent” with sheets and blankets draped over chairs. If you have sleeping bags, dig them out – or just create some bedrolls with blankets and pillows. Tell stories and sing songs around an imaginary fire. And when the lights go out, make a beautiful galaxy appear on the ceiling of your tent by shining a flashlight through a colander.

Age Appropriate: 3 & up

Ideas from Cheap fun for kids: Baby Center
Haba Igloo Collapsible Tent Shown

{ Comments on this entry are closed }

Who said it’s not easy being green?

by Stacy on October 19, 2008

Kermit Costume

Stephanie from Beautiful Impressions has simplified being green for the rest of us and I just can’t thank her enough. She took a regular child’s sweatsuit and a little time and ingenuity and created one terrific child’s Halloween costume. If you have procrastinated this long and think you don’t have enough time to make something personal, think again. Stephanie just made your day.

Check out full details on her blog, here

Update: I’m sorry to report Stephanie has taken down her blog Don’t worry, we have plenty more handcrafted halloween costumes in the DIY Halloween Costume round-up and we’ll be adding new costumes for 2010 later this week, including the cowboy & cowgirl costumes I made last year.

Thanks so much for stopping by, hope you’ll check out all the other great stuff going on at Kids Stuff World.

{ Comments on this entry are closed }

Fairy Wishes, Butterfly Dreams

by Stacy on October 15, 2008

Butterfly costume
Photo from here

I stumbled across this image a few months ago and just knew I wanted to recreate this costume for my daughter for Halloween. I threw all reality out the window and went sheerly on impulse disregarding the fact that my 20 month old has never worn a costume, let alone a super pouffy tutu and is pretty particular about her clothing. In preparation for the event, I scooped up tons of gorgeous tulle, I researched the easiest ways to create a tutu online, and then I got to work creating my own version of this fairy skirt each night after work. Hours later I ended up with one gorgeous tutu if I must say so myself. I chose to mix colors pink, blue, and purple in several layers creating a beautiful effect. I was so excited for my little one to see the finished product. I waited patiently all day on Saturday waiting for the perfect opportunity to introduce her to my beautiful creation. It never once occurred to me, no not even once, that my wee one would be DEATHLY afraid of the thing. Yes, deathly. Just being near it brings her to tears, its a real shame- she would have made the most beautiful butterfly/fairy. So it goes, there’s always next year – or the year after that…

I used this method with more layering and color blending to create a no-sew tutu. I’ll post pictures of my version this weekend.

{ Comments on this entry are closed }

← Previous Entries