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Art & craft

Caterpillar corn shaker

Before getting distracted by dinosaurs we were focusing on the letter C this past week. We ‘camped’ outside, chased chooks, made chocolates and read The Very Hungry Caterpillar.

‘camping’ in our backyard

After seeing some great corn shakers and caterpillar crafts in blogland we decided to combine the two into a caterpillar corn shaker! We used a cardboard roll and Master D painted it up before we added our corn, sealed the ends and added the final details.

Since then Little Miss Q has been enjoying listening to caterpillar corn shaker music 🙂

And here are our fingerprint caterpillars too (I can’t remember which blog inspired this painting – let me know if it was yours!).

Thanks for reading, Kelly

October 27, 2011 by

Gnomes and fairy doors

Browsing through Etsy (as I often find myself doing) I came across some gorgeous fairy doors and gnomes. After buying a couple (who could resist) I thought I would have a go at making some myself. Luckily I came across some great tutorials and patterns on Wee Folk Art.

This is one I bought from Beneath the Rowan Tree on Etsy

After rummaging through the garage to find some wood scraps and buying a wood burner (new tool yay!) I gave it a go. I did some test burning first and then tried out the gnome patterns and some fairy doors. My husband then gave me a quick tutorial in using the jigsaw and off I went (with a new found love of power tools)!

After I had them all cut out, I got to try out another power tool – a dremel (what fun!), before doing some hand sanding. After they were nice and smooth I painted them with milk paint which is non toxic. Awhile later I made up a beeswax and olive oil treatment to go over the top. Here they are – I love them and have a whole new lot ready to go!!

Using the gnome pattern

The next lot

Thanks for reading, Kelly

October 26, 2011 by