Toddler Friendly Gardening

3 years ago, I never would have believed that I would have a child and that BABY would have her own garden.  Parenting is eye opening in so many ways and this Spring, I learned that my 2.5 year old can handle her own garden!

Related Pages: Make Garden Markers, Bird Feeder Craft, Kids Stick Crafts

Whether you have 10 acres or only a back patio, you easily create a TODDLER GARDEN.

My top choice for a toddler’s first crop:  POTATOES!

Potato Plant in Our Garden

Potatoes are hardy, plentiful and practically foolproof!  They grow quickly and can be harvested early (“new”potatoes) or left in the ground for larger potatoes.  This way, you child can provide food for the family over a longer period of time and let’s face it, potatoes are DELICIOUS!

Kids’ Gardening Materials & Techniques:

• Seed potatoes
• Now a quick note on potato seedlings.  For the simplest & cheapest toddler garden, you can use any ole potato growing a sprout.  HOWEVER, it is best to use disease free, certified seed potatoes bought from a garden supply store.  Using grocery potatoes or saving potatoes from last year’s crop will likely weaken the plants every year through easily transmitted plant diseases.  With that said, a few potatoes in a corner probably won’t hurt anything!  There’s a reason people call  me the “Lazy Green Mama”:)
•  Garden area:  either a small, sunny spot of open ground or a large barrel
• If using a barrel or large bucket: (ask for discarded food-grade buckets from your local bakery/deli!)
• Drill a few holes in the bottom and along bottom sides for drainage
• Place 2”of gravel in the bottom for drainage
• Top with about 6”of dirt
• If planting in the ground, it is recommended to plant potatoes in a long trench and back fill with the dirt as the plants grow.

Adding dirt as the potato grows

• Plant the potatoes with the sprout pointing UP.  Cover with a few inches of dirt and water gently (ahem…maybe your child can handle this…mine, not so much!)!  Place in direct sun and water about every other day.
• Fortunately, potato plants have large green foliage, so it should be easy for your toddler to identify weeds and gently pull them out of the dirt.
• As the plants grow, you can either harvest your small potatoes or keep covering the plant with soil to encourage more growth!
• Once your plant is about 5”tall, add more soil so that only the tip is showing.  Continue this until the plant yellows and wilts… time to harvest!

Adding even more dirt as the plant grows

• Small watering can
• We like to give our toddler a large bucket filled with water so that she can fill her watering can by herself.  Remember to never leave your child unattended around water!

Potato watering and trampling (Editor's note: Dogs are good at trampling, too!!)

• Small hand shovel (however our child prefers to use her hands for planting and weeding!)
• We prefer to give our toddler REAL tools whenever possible.  There are a lot of great resources for child sized real tools (check any montessori supply company)
• Sandbox shovels also work great

 Other great FIRST crops that are easy for toddlers and kids to grow in their garden:

• Strawberries
• Cherry tomatoes
• Lettuce

Please leave a comment sharing your toddler garden plans, triumphs and mishaps!  We’re in this together :)

Easy, healthy, and fun snack that kids can help make.

In case you haven’t noticed yet, I’m pretty much addicted to Pinterest, and if you’re into crafting, you probably already know why.  A friend recently pinned a version of frozen yogurt dots from One Good Thing By Jillee.  I thought they looked awesome, and decided to make it a bit more of a “craft” rather than just a recipe; and this is what we ended up with.

Related Pages: Fruit and Cheese Kebabs, 20 Easy Summer Recipes Kids Will Love, Watermelon Recipes

What You Need to Make Yogurt “Dippin’ Dots” In the Freezer

• Yogurt
• Bananas
• Food coloring (optional, especially if you use fruit or berry yogurt)
• Plastic zip bags
• Cookie sheet
• Freezer

Ingredients for the yogurt dot freezer recipe.

Put about one half cup of yogurt, one half a sliced banana, and three drops of food coloring in a zip bag.

Let your little ones have fun squishing it all together. It's fun to see how different colors mix together and to get the bananas nice and squished.

Use your scissors to cut a small corner off the bag and use it to "pipe" the mixture onto the cookie sheet in quarter-sized blobs.

Put the cookies sheet into the freezer and let the yogurt dots set up for a couple of hours before removing them with a spatula.

Store them in an airtight container in the freezer. They melt pretty quickly in little fingers, so I just take out enough for a snack and leave the rest of the container in the freezer. Super yummy and fun to eat!

What I Learned the Hard Way:

#1. You really, really have to squish the bananas or else the chunks will be too big to fit through the hole when you’re piping the mixture onto the cookies sheet.

#2. If you used cheap plastic bags, they will probably leak.

But cleanup is so tasty!

Simple and Cute Scrap Fabric Flower Headband Tutorial

There are few things that are cuter or more on trend in hair accessories than rosettes right now. They’re also surprisingly simple to make!

Related Pages: Silk Flower Barrette Craft, Cute Barrette Holder Project

How to Make a Fabric Flower Hair Accessory Headband

Supplies:

• Two strips of scrap fabric, 2 inches wide by 16 inches long
• Two pieces of tulle, 2.5 inches square.
• Scrap felt
• Beads or pearls
• Wire or elastic headband
• Hot glue gun or strong craft glue

Start by cutting out your fabric to the specified sizes. This is great for using up scraps, so don’t worry about straight lines.

To start your first rosette, take one strip of fabric, and fold it in half lengthwise. Fold one corner down, and begin rolling your strip of fabric in on itself.

As you roll your strip, you want to twist the fabric like in the photos above. Twist an inch or so, and roll it up, pinching firmly to hold it together. When you get to the end, leave about an inch or so of fabric loose.

Flip your rosette over, and put some hot glue on the back of the rosette. Fold the extra inch of fabric over the glue, and hold to join. When your glue has set, trim off the corners. There you have your first rosette!

Repeat with your second strip of fabric to make another rosette.

Cut a piece of felt that is slightly smaller than both of the rosettes Glue your rosettes onto the felt, and set aside.

Take one of your pieces of tulle, gather and pinch it in the middle, and fold it in half at the pinch. Put some hot glue at the pinched end, and glue it on the felt between your rosettes. Repeat with the other piece of tulle on the other side.

Next, put a dot of hot glue where the tulle meets the rosettes, and put a cluster of beads or pearls on the glue. Repeat on the other side.

Pick out your headband, and put a line of glue on the back of your rosettes, on the felt. Attach the headband, then glue another small piece of felt on top of your headband to cover to join and secure the rosettes.

You’re all done! You just made a rosette headband that looks cute on everyone, and can be made to match every outfit!

Butterfly Mobile Craft for Kids

For her birthday, my daughter got a book called 50 Rainy Day Activities (50 Things to Make and Do), and it is full of awesome crafts for kids.  I finally had to give her a stack of sticky notes to go through and mark all the crafts she wanted to do!  Our first one was this butterfly mobile craft.

Related Pages: Butterfly Fairy Coloring Pages, The Very Hungry Caterpillar Activities and Lesson Plan

What You Need to Make a Butterfly Mobile:

• Paint
• White paper  (ours is on finger paint paper)
• White glue
• Yarn or string of some type
• Glitter or salt
• Drinking straw
• Large bead or button
• Scissors

Craft supplies needed to make a butterfly mobile with kids.

The butterfly mobile instructions called for watered down craft paints, but we decided to do some finger painting instead.

Paint your paper however you like for your butterfly mobile's wings.

While the paint is still wet, sprinkle on some glitter or salt to make your butterfly's wings catch the light.

Once the paint has dried, fold the paper in half (short edges together, with glue sandwiched in between.  This makes it so that both sides are now painted.

Stretch out your bendy straw, and cut it off, just above where it bends. Trim the other end to be the right length for your butterfly's body.

Cut the accordion (bendy) part of the straw vertically down the middle and gently bend the two sides apart. The result is antennas for your butterfly mobile craft.

Feed the yarn or string through the straw, with a bead or button on the bottom end to keep it from coming back through. Glue this body in place on your butterfly.

Once your butterfly mobile is dry, hang it up where ever you want some color!

What I Learned the Hard Way:

It's not even a new lesson at this point.

Related Pages: Snake Door Draft Blocker, Easy Fabric Flower Jewelry

What you need to make shrinky dink buttons:

• Shrink plastic (frosted)
• 1 1/2″ circle punch (I used a 2″ punch but think 1 1/2″ would work better)
• Permanent markers
• Hole punch
• Baking sheet
• Parchment paper or cut up paper bag

The basic craft supplies needed for DIY buttons.

Use your circle punch to create 1 1/2" circles.

You can make several buttons out of one sheet of shrink plastic.

To get the button holes even, punch a circle from a piece of construction paper. Fold in half and then in half again. Unfold once and punch a hole on the line. When you open it up, you will have two corresponding button holes.

Draw whatever image you want on the frosted side of your buttons. If you use letters, they need to be written backward to show up properly when you're done.

If you’re not such a good artist (as you can tell from the photo above, I’m not), you might want to check out the awesome free templates that are available on Scissors.Paper.Wok.  So very cool.

Place them on the parchment paper/paper bag on a cookie sheet, and bake according to the directions on the shrink plastic package.

You may need to flatten your Shrinky Dink buttons with a spatula when they come out of the oven.

What I Learned the Hard Way:  Like I said, I would use a 1 1/2″ punch next time, as I think they would shrink more uniformly than mine did.

Our 3D turtles are living in the dining room window.

Now, this 3-D turtle craft is just so darn cute, and it just takes things you probably already have around the house. We got the idea from a book my daughter was given that’s called Animal Things to Make and Do.  There were some really cool crafts in the book, and I imagine you’ll be seeing more of them here.

What You Need to Make a 3-D Paper Turtle Craft:

• Green construction paper
• Some other kind of paper for the shell (we used scrapbooking paper with a picture of grass on it)
• White glue
• Marker
• Scissors
• Something round to trace

Craft supplies for your 3-D paper turtles

Trace your circle to make the shell of your paper turtle.

Trace a smaller circle in the center and divide it into eight sections.

Cut along the straight lines. Add glue to each edge and press it together with the one next to it. This is what makes your paper turtle shell 3D.

Lay your 3-D paper turtle shell onto your green construction paper and outline your turtle's body.

Add glue around the edges and press your shell onto the turtle. This is the trickiest part of the turtle craft, but it ended up being easier than I feared.

Totally adorable craft for kids, right?

Related Pages: Recycled Box Aliens, Printable Monster Masks

What You Need to Make Recycled Tissue Box Monsters:

• Tissue Box
• Egg Carton
• White Glue
• White Paper (or craft foam)
• Scissors
• Pipe Cleaner
• Googly Eyes
• Hot Glue (optional, but recommended)

Pretty simple supplies are all you need for this recycled craft.

Cut the opening in your tissue box so that it reaches all the way to the top on one side.

Cut out two rows of jagged monster teeth from white construction paper or craft foam. (Craft foam will hold up way better.)

Add glue to the sides for the top row of monster teeth and to the sides and long edge for the bottom row. I also reinforced my top row with a couple of pieces of transparent tape once I set them in.

Cut out egg carton cups and glue googly eyes onto the bottoms. Your monster craft can have as many eyes as you want!

Glue the egg cups to the top of your boogie monster. I chose to use hot glue because it held them in place better.

Poke some holes in the top of your recycled tissue box, behind the eyes. Again, you can give your monster as many antennas as you'd like. I went with two, but the little one insisted on five (to match the number of eyes she'd insisted on earlier, of course!)

Feed your pipe cleaners through the holes, and your boogie monster now has antennas, or hair, or tentacles...

What I Learned the Hard Way:  I originally found this idea through someone else who found it at Giggles Galore, where Mariah calls them Tattle Monsters.  She used white craft foam, and it would be a lot easier to work with.  As you can see, our teeth ripped before we were even done making our craft.  If you’re like me, though, and are stubborn enough to just use what you have on hand, I’d recommend doing the antennas before gluing in the teeth.

Make a Pillbox Hat from a Microwave Dinner Tray	Recycle a Sock into a Giraffe Sock Puppet	Make Stuffed Animal Headphones Via DollarStoreCrafts	Adorable Egg Carton Crafts Roundup on The Crafty Crow
One Pretty Thing Shares 12 More Recycled Crafts!	Make Egg Carton Caterpillars	Make a Nightlight from a Recycled Crystal Light Container	Recycled Jello Box Aliens
Make a “fossil” from coffee grounds	Turn an old pair of jeans into a denim purse	Refashioned T-Shirts	Upcycled Photo Holder or Jewelry Holder

For more green goodness, check out our collection of Earth Day printables, crafts, and activities for kids from all Woo! Jr. Network websites!

Completed Vintage Easter Paper Toy Set

Most of you probably don’t know that I am a voracious collector of many kids of antiques and vintage items. Primarily I collect dishes, figurines, enamelware, and vintage fabrics. But most of all, I collect vintage paper items: books, magazines, scrapbooks, postcards, and greeting cards (more on that below!). Most of the items are a little too ‘grown up’ to share with you on any of the Woo! Jr. sites, but this one is just perfect for kids!

Below is a printable page of an adorable Vintage Easter scene, with four stand-up bunnies along with a rabbit hutch. It comes from an April, 1914 issue of McCall’s magazine, and was included just for the children of their regular readers. All you need to make it is scissors and some glue. The cutting may be a little tricky for younger children, in which case I recommend letting them simply cut out the shapes while leaving some white space around the lines. Mom or Dad may have to cut out the hutch, though, because the assembly on that piece requires that you cut the pieces out on the lines.

Related Pages: Printable Easter Cards, Printable Easter Templates, more Printable Easter Crafts

Printable Easter Paper Toy from 1914

For those of you who haven’t heard, I’ve started a new website called Vintage Fangirl, with vintage printables and crafts from a wide variety of sources, including from my own personal antique ephemera collection. It’s kind of like a Woo! Jr. for grownups! Currently I’m in the midst of running a series of 25 Days of Easter Pictures, and I’ve included some of the highlights of images in the series below. All the images on my new site are free, just like they are here!

Just click on the thumbnails to go to the full page size vintage Easter pictures and clip art!

Retro Peter Cottontail Clip Art	Antique Easter Egg Boat on the Sea	Retro Easter Bunnies Card
1886 Bunny Carriage Card	Bicycling Easter Bunnies	Vintage Easter Bunny Illustration
Vintage Happy Easter Postcard	Weathered Wood Easter Cross	Old Easter Lilies Picture

If you make any crafts with them, please let me know via the contact page because I’d love to feature your work!

Fun Bunny Cupcake Idea

Related Pages: Easter Mad Libs, Printable Easter Crafts, Easter Kids Poems, Easter Coloring Pages

What you Need to Make Bunny Cupcakes

Pre-made cupcakes frosted with white frosting

Bunny gummy candies

Large white marshmallows

Small pastel colored marshmallows

Chocolate syrup, mini chocolate chips, or other tiny round candies /sprinkles for the bunny eyes

How to Make Bunny Cupcakes

Honestly, decorating with gummy bunnies is pretty self-explanatory. I put four onto the cupcake and then added an extra dot of white frosting in the middle.

Make Bunny Cupcakes

For the bunny face cupcake, I cut large white marshmallows in half, then in half again so that it was cut in quarters. (You can cut marshmallows with a butter knife or plastic knife, don’t let the big steak knife fool you!)

Place two of the marshmallow quarters onto the cupcake, sticky side down. Place a small pink marshmallow onto the bottom of the bunny face for the nose. I then took a toothpick and dabbed a tiny bit of chocolate syrup on the end, and placed the dots for the bunny eyes. This was my improvisation because I didn’t have any sprinkles or chocolate mini morsels laying around (what kind of cook am I that doesn’t have mini morsels in her kitchen?!).

(Check out more Easter cupcakes at Hoosier Homemade!)