Hand Print Snowflake Project

I love making little projects with my kids' hand prints. It is such a fun way to remember how small their sweet hands are at this age! We got pretty crafty during a recent snow day home from school so I took the opportunity to make a project with some hand print snowflakes!

As always, I used Kids Washable Crayola Paint. I painted a mix of light and dark blue on one of their hands and made the prints on white construction paper. To make the snowflake, you'll need to do multiple prints, each a little off center from the one before. We did 6-8 prints for each snowflake. Reapply the paint after every two hand prints so it doesn't get too used up.

Before the paint was dry, I had my kids sprinkle glitter (yay!) on their snowflake. This kind of paint dries very quickly so you need to move fast. We used white glitter.

 Meanwhile, I created a sign for our snowflakes on a sheet of 6x12 bright blue card stock. I used a silver metallic permanent marker to write "Our Little Snowflakes" and then added the year.

Once the snowflakes were dry, I cut them out and used a hold punch to add a hole at the top of each, as well as a hole for each on my sign. I used varying lengths of white yarn to attach my snowflakes to the sign. Here's how I made it look nice without any knots:

I threaded the yarn through as a loop into the snowflake hole.

Then I passed the two open ends of yarn through that loop and pulled tight. If your hole breaks, just reinforce it with clear tape and punch another hole through that.

Next I threaded both loose ends of my yarn UP through the hole in my sign. Wrap your two loose ends around the yarn connecting to the snowflake and tie a knot behind that.

Use tape to secure the knot to the back of your sign and pull tight.

This is such a cute decorate to have in my kitchen now - and it is one to save and pull out again each winter! I made one with my friend's children as a fun gift for her and we used blue paper as a background for our white and light blue painted hand prints.

Snow Day Fun - Indoor Carnival!

Being stuck inside on a snow day is no excuse for boredom! I decided to transform my whole house into an indoor carnival when my two kids were home from school on a very cold snow day. Each room had a couple different games in it and I acted as their ring master to guide them from game to game. As my kids watched tv, I set it all up and had it ready to play, but then my kids had a fun time coming up with their own games! My daughter even set up a prize stand in her room, assigning points to each item so it was a great bit of math practice when it was time to cash in our prizes!

Here are a few of the games I came up with:

I used Washable Crayola markers to draw a huge target on our living room windows and had the kids shoot their dart guns at it.

We bounced plastic buttons into a display of plastic trays... from the Dollar Spot at Target! Score!

Just timing each other while we did a simple puzzle was really fun.

Here's my favorite one: a water shooting gallery!! I drew several circles across the back of my bathtub using Washable Crayola markers. Then the kids stood next to the tub and shot at the dots with water guns! The only thing to get wet was my bathtub, and as they kept shooting, the colored dots disappeared! We actually re-did this game a few times because it was such a big hit!

Here's a giant ring toss consisting of a hula hoop and a skinny little shelf I had in our family room.  You just need something sturdy enough that it won't fall over when the ring hits it! Even a person sitting down will work - we did it that way too. ;O)

We tossed a small basketball into a large basket in our hallway...

... and I set up a bean bag toss using a few bowls from our kitchen. Check out a Valentine's Day version I made HERE that shows how to make homemade bean bags!


We did have a few other simple games, and then my kids' games they made up got a little silly, but it was definitely a fun and different way to spend some time at home on a snow day! Plus we got prizes! Have fun!