Christmas caroler craft

We are now back from our (irresponisbly unannounced) holiday haitus, a break that was from the computer only, not so much from life. As it turns out my biggest issue with keeping up with the blog over the past few weeks wasn't at all a lack of things to post, but rather a need ot keep said things secret. Crafting is fun to post, when it isn't meant as a gift for someone else who happens to visit the site on a regular basis, like the grandparents.

The Christmas holiday to us is a lot about tradition, family, and showing others that you care, sometimes through gift giving. In previous years we have included Calvin in both the gift giving and getting, but this year I thought was the right year to really get him involved in a more active way, and something about having him pick out gifts for us to buy so he could give them to others just didn't sit well with me. Instead, we decided to have him make the gifts he gave so that they would most truthfully be from him. I scoured the internet for general ideas and gave Calvin a rather long list to choose from. In the end we made wine charms for the men in his life, and painted book bags and a Christmas Caroler decoration for the women. I will post about the others later, although as crafts they are pretty straight forward, and here I will tell you about our Christmas carolers because they were the biggest hit of all.

Christmas Carolers

The idea for this craft came from a Disney kids idea guide; they had made a caroler out of a tube, pretty much as I do here, and set it on a mantle. Calvin and I expanded on the idea by making our carolers three, and giving them a base and a snow scene. Here's how we did it.

Supplies: cardboard tubes, paint & brushes, construction paper (light peach for faces, and mitten and snow colors), marker (black), colored pencil (petal pink), children's socks, raffia, cotton batting, styrofoam sheet(s), craft glue & brush, hot glue & glue gun, snow flake punch.

1. First we collected our paper tubes. I actually took wrapping paper tubes and used a saw to cut them down to size—about the size of a paper towel tube, a toilet paper tube and something inbetween, but the wrapping paper tubes were thicker and stronger. Then we painted our tubes, using a different color for each caroler, and gave them an afternoon to dry.

2. While Calvin was napping I cut the construction paper (actually I used scrapbooking paper) in the necessary shapes—ovals out of the peach and mittens out of three other colors. Then, after his nap, I drew the faces on the ovals with a black Sharpie and Calvin used the colored pencil to give them pink cheeks. Calvin put dabs of glue on the faces, used a brush to spread it around, then I adhered them to the tubes in the proper places.

3. To make the hats we cut the ribbed portion off of each sock (Calvin was actually able to do this while I held the sock), folded one end back and tied the other with raffia. Calvin did the folding and cutting and put the hat on each little caroler. I did the tying, and I added a dab of hot glue to each raffia knot and a line of hot glue under the edge of each hat.

4. To make their books we found some unused double-sided music (you could also print some off the web), and folded it in half lenghtwise. I held the paper while Calvin cut out each book from the folded edge. We glued the mittens to the music first, then to the tubes, Calvin again applying the glue and using a brush to spread it around before I did the attaching, holding it in place until it adhered well. Now are carolers themselves were done!

5. To make the bases I used my chef's knife (it will never forgive me!) to cut 1 inch thick sheets of styrofoam down to the size I wanted—I think about 12 inches by 5 inches. Then I posed the carolers on the sheets and traced around them, then used a butter knife to cut along the traced circles, making a groove wide and deep enough to seat each tube down into the styrofoam about 1/4 inch, then I lined each groove with hot glue before sliding the caroler into it.
We used cotton filling to make the snow; Calvin pulled it apart and I added dabs of hot glue just before he pressed the pieces to the syrofoam base. Lastly, Calvin used a snowflake paper punch to cut flakes from papers in dark blue, light blue, and sparkly white, then he pressed them onto dots of hot glue I added to the top of the cotton. Done.

 

Stick figures

For Christmas last year we got Calvin an easel, a present that has seen plenty of use and love the whole year through (as attested to by the multitude of paint splatters and occasionally misplaced stickers).  Calvin's favorite medium has been paint, which he uses in an abstract style that brings a vibrant touch of color to the play room, where I have several of his pieces hanging for daily enjoyment. I like the abstract feel.

Lately, though, Calvin has branched out into the wide world of crayons. After spending some time at the easel by himself one evening last week he was upstairs reading books with Jon before bed while I straightened up a bit downstairs. That's when I stumbled across the stick figures. I was so excited to find something, that even remotely resembled something other than tumble weed, that I ran upstairs, new art in hand, to ask Calvin what he's drawn. He told me all about the eyes, ears. mouths, and bodies he had drawn.

"They're garbage men" he told me.

Gingerbread train!

I'm always looking for fun winter activities, especially the kind that make the holidays merry and bright, but it was my mom who thought to grab up this adorable gingerbread train and give it to Calvin for Sinterklaasavond. He'd been asking to put it together ever since, but with a long list of other chores and away-from-home activities, like going to the store and finishing our Christmas shopping, we just finally got to our train building a few days ago. The wait was worth it, though!

He kept calling the frosting "glue"

Mmmm....almost good enough to eat, but we'll just stick to sniffing.

Five little snowmen

We had to retire the pumpkin and turkey tail feather counting rhymes/games, but this is our new winter felt fun.

Five little snowmen sitting on a hill
Five little snowmen sitting verry still
The sun came out and melted one away
Now there's four little snowmen sitting there today

etc., etc.

Train shows

Last weekend we took Calvin to a train show in Saline and I had every intention of writing about the trip, but post-Thanksgiving-pre-Sinterklaasavon exhaustion had me going to bed too early to get any writing in, and by the time I had any energy the second train show of the week had rolled around, and then there was twice as much to write.

Last Christmas, so nearly a year ago now, Jon and I got Calvin his first train set. We weren't sure at the time whether he'd have any interest in it or not so we went the cheap route and brought home Ikea's version. Now, a year later, even two train shows in a week have done nothing to temper the kid's love for this hobby. In fact, far from sending him over to the side of boredom, I think the extra exposure actually stoked the flame. We bought the train set on a whim last season; this season trains and train accessories make up over three quarters of the kid's personal Christmas list. I think hobbies are important, and for a homeschooler a strong interest in a hobby can be a real teaching aid. So, either we've started a monster, or we hit the hobby jackpot, you can be the judge.

Last Sunday our first show stop was at the Saline Fair Grounds. When I say first stop, I mean first in an inaugural sense, and we had no idea what to expect. Who knew there were so many different kinds (scales) of trains besides "wood"? And they had that, too, by the way—a small Thomas set-up on a table in the corner. Calvin is unfamiliar with Thomas. Although I harbor a brand-loyalty infection planted deep within my brain, it's something we feel vaguely strange about fostering in our child, so we've avoided character adoration right down the line, Thomas included (not to mention that there's something a little psycho about a train with a face, isn't there?), so even though he's clealry attached to his wood train setup at home, he was not particularly interested in that part of the show. The Lego electric train table was also a failure, although Jon and I found it rather interesting ourselves.

HO, G, and really, really tiny (possibly T?) were some the scales we saw in exhibitors' layouts. Calvin was most drawn to any train that was moving. In particular he liked any layout that included a road crossing with active lights and signals. And whistles. He loves train whistles.

The final winner on the interest scale was the steam locomotive exhibit. We spent the majority of our time walking around their track, watching them light flames in the engines, and refill their boilers with water and tanks with butane. They were larger pieces so they were easier to get a really good look at, and since they were actually steaming there was something of the old world about the entire set.

And, thanks to the one wood train vendor there, Calvin came home the proud new owner of a pair of semaphores. And we are now the proud parents of a three year old who can tell you all about the use of semaphores on a train line.

The second show of the week was not a vendor show, but actually an evening spent at the monthly open house of the Ann Arbor Train Club's exhibit located in the Dexter Train Depot. If I tell you that we drove down to the Depot in a cold rain, long after the winter night had arrived, and got lucky enough to find a spot right in front of the depot just as the signal lights started flashing to announce the upcoming passing of the real Amtrak passanger train from Ann Arbor, you'll either think we live a charmed life or that I made it all up, but that's exactly what happened. Talk about excitement.

I think the show inside might have been a bit of a let down after the eral encounter right outside, but it was packed with people and trains alike, and with a very festive atmosphere to boot. One train even carried a Santa, waving from the caboose, and box cars filled with presents wrapped in seasonal spledor. The electricity in the air didin't come only from the trains.

This was only our second visit to the A2 Club's open house night, but I love it already. The room is small enugh not to be overwhelming, and I have yet to meet a train hobbyist who has not been so in love with their chosen pastime as to want to share and share and share. Calvin's young enough that he sometimes meets with watchful, even suspicious, stares from train owners and protectors, but they warm up immediately when he starts asking questions using words like "semaphore," "steam locomotive" or "derailment."

It's a fun hobby.