oliver’s school makings

Well, I have some serious catching up to do here in blog-land.. I’ll start off with a selection of some of Oliver’s school work and projects from last year 2010..



This was a project he worked on through the Autumn term, and he got to bring home the finished article just before Christmas.. it’s a picture frame which he designed, planned, fabricated from wood, painted, and decorated all by himself! He is very proud of it, rightly so!



This is a table centerpiece he made at school the week before Christmas, it came home with him to grace our Christmas dinner-table, it was lovely with the candle lit..



A beautiful still-life artwork, a pastel drawing he made at school of a vase of flowers and foliage.. this is going in a frame up on the wall..



This was a homework project from back in May, he had to produce an piece of artwork relating to The Wild Woods – a book by Simon James, a local author of children’s books; who incidentally my Dad used to teach to play the guitar many years ago, we have a copy of Simon’s first book The Day Jake Vacuumed in our family signed by Simon with a sketch of Jake playing the guitar!



Simon visited Oliver’s school shortly before this to give a talk and presentation to the kids on his work processes for writing and illustrating children’s story books, which I was also lucky enough to attend. Oliver found it very inspiring..



While I was in school Oliver showed me his monster puppet, a project he worked on last year, again designing and making it himself, stitching the felt shapes together and gluing on the features..



I love that there are so many opportunities at school for the kids to get crafty and creative, and I’m sure it helps that we do a lot of crafty stuff at home!

first week of school and hair accessories roundup

With my daughter Cyan starting school for the first time, I decided to document this first week, with a photo of her each morning, all ready for school; and I crafted a hair accessory for her each evening, utilising my lovely stash of green (our school colour) ribbons, all from the fabulous craftyribbons.com..


Click the title for each day to read the full post, with tutorials for each hair accessory..

Monday.. interchangeable bows for hair clips..



Tuesday.. ribbon hair bun covers..



Wednesday.. hair ribbon streamers..



Thursday.. ribbon covered hair clips with buttons..



Friday.. embellished hair bands..



Well Cyan certainly enjoyed her first week at school, and big brother Oliver had a good week too (once he got over the cough he was suffering with earlier in the week), he is now in Year 3 which is his first junior year.. so exciting times for both my kids!

We are all worn out (especially me, I won’t be writing daily blog posts again for a while!) and looking forward to a nice relaxing weekend.. we are off to our local museum tomorrow for a Japanese themed family craft event – making card samurai swords and helmets – that should be fun!

Sharing at the fabulous link parties on my sidebar, go check them out..

fifth day at school and embellished hair bands

The last day of Cyan’s first week at school..

Cyan’s favourite things about school this first week:
seeing her old friends and meeting all the new children, playing with ‘threading toy’, playing with ‘funny animals toy’ (sounds like construction toy to make funny mixed up animals using body parts of all different animals), counting up to 100 (which she demonstrated effortlessly for me on the way home today).



It didn’t surprise me that from the hair clips I made last night she picked the velvet ribbon and star button pair to wear today (they were my favourites too)..

I was trying to think of another different hair accessory I could make tonight, then I remembered we had a couple of hair bands saved for school, in green and white of course, which I could decorate with some more of my school ribbon stash.. so Friday’s hair accessory is..

Hair bands embellished with bows and flowers

You will need:
Ribbons
Buttons
Hair bands
Hot glue gun
Needle and thread
Sharp scissors



I made a bow to go on the green spot hair band, using 3 different ribbons, sewn together in the middle..



Then fixed to the hair band with a little hot glue and a few stitches around the band..



Get the hot glue out again to fix another ribbon around the middle of the bow..



A medley of polka dots..



For the white band I made some simple rosette flowers.. to make these you need a length of ribbon about 4-6" long, hand-sew a running stitch along one long edge (didn’t photograph this stage), pull thread to create the rosette shape, tie thread off to secure, then sew button in the centre.



Work out arrangement so they sit nicely next to each other on the band..



Attach flowers with hot glue..



And now we have two much prettier hair bands for Cyan to wear..

fourth day of school and ribbon covered hairclips

Day four at school for Cyan.. she is loving it! Wearing her green and white striped summer dress today.. Striped school summer dresses are not so common as gingham ones, we do like to be individual!

We were given a book from school with pages for Cyan to fill in about herself, she drew this picture of herself today, with her striped dress – and hair accessories!



I really wanted to use the grosgrain polka dot ribbon on something, it didn’t work on any of the accessories I made so far, and I also found some lovely green velvet ribbon with a striped texture while going through my stash of ribbons.. so Thursday’s hair accessory is..

Ribbon covered hair clips with buttons

You will need:
Ribbons
Buttons or other embellishments
Hair clips
Craft glue
Hot glue gun
Sharp scissors



Cut ribbon lengths to fit around hair clips..

Apply craft glue to half of ribbon reverse, snap into place in clip..



Apply craft glue to the remaining half of ribbon reverse..



Fold up around front of clip..



Wrap round to the back, the end should line up with the other end trapped in the clip..



Pick out some fun buttons or embellishments..



Use hot glue gun to stick on the buttons..



These were really simple and a lot of fun to make, and they are completely different to Cyan’s other clips with bows that I made on Monday..

third day of school and hair ribbon streamers

The next installment of Cyan showing off her school uniform..

Grey tunic dress paired with a white blouse with cute flower embroidery on the collar (the blouse is another of my mum’s charity shop finds)..



You can see her hair in buns with the bun covers I made last night, which almost worked.. they were just a little too small to stay put :(



Onto today’s hair accessory, this is the most simple hair accessory to make with ribbon, we have made them before with various different colours and lengths of ribbon.. so Wednesday’s hair accessory is..

Hair ribbon streamers

You will need
Assortment of lovely ribbons
Hair elastics
Sharp scissors



Cut lengths of ribbon.. for these I used 6" lengths..
(I didn’t end up using the grosgrain polka dots in the above picture, they don’t hang right, the organza and lighter weight ribbons work best)

Tie each ribbon tightly onto the hair elastic, and pull into shape.. done!



Seriously these are so easy, and little girls love them.. I kept these fairly short for school.. I have made them before with much longer lengths, so they are like proper streamers, and Cyan called them ‘princess hair ribbons’!

second day of school and hair bun covers

Second day of school for Cyan.. Oliver unfortunately is trying to kick a cough, he was just well enough for his first day back yesterday, but the day took it’s toll and he was up coughing in the night again so he’s been at home with Daddy today.. (How is it they have a 6-week summer holiday and Oli manages to get a cough the week before school starts?!)



Cyan’s first day went really well yesterday, sounds like she had a lot of fun; and she is so excited about making new friends – and catching up with her old friends who went to the same pre-school. She came down the stairs this morning from brushing her teeth at 8am saying “I’m ready, can I go to school now?” (We live very close to the school and don't normally leave until 8:30-8:40!)

Today Cyan chose to wear her proper ‘big girl’ ensemble of grey skirt, white blouse and tie! She was most insistent that she wanted to wear her tie today, and is loving the fact that I am letting her choose a different uniform outfit each day this week! (Usually I like to get a few days wear out of clothes to reduce my laundry commitments! And yes, this does sometimes cause arguments..)



With the green cardigan.. This cardigan is labelled as age 3-4 and is still too big for Cyan, she’s not even so dinky anymore after this summer’s growth spurt, and she just turned 5! The cardigan stayed on just long enough for me to snap a photo, Cyan is a warm child, doesn’t like wearing extra layers (except for princess dresses/cloaks and the like!) and she won’t really need to wear it until the weather gets a lot colder.

And the hair accessory craft of the day.. I was thinking.. what other (practical) styles could we do with Cyan’s hair, apart from the obvious plaits, pigtails, ponytail etc.? I thought it might be fun to put her hair in two little buns, but her hair is quite fine and thin, and very slippy so it won't stay in a bun without a bun cover (like the crochet ones you wear for ballet)..

I don’t crochet, so for Tuesday we’re going to make..

Ribbon hair bun covers

You will need
Organza ribbon and/or lace type trim



Before you start you will need to put your girl’s hair roughly in a bun and work out the length of ribbons you will need.. With Cyan’s hair in two buns, the length I needed to fit across one bun was approx 3.5". Add 2" for casing allowance. I cut 2 x 5.5" lengths of polka dot organza ribbon (from my school colours ribbon collection) and 1 x 5.5" length of this cute cotton lace type trim which I found in my stash.. I used 3 lengths for each small bun cover, for a single bun cover or if your girl’s hair is thicker than Cyan’s you will probably want 4 lengths or more..



Fold the ends and sew to make the casing for the ribbon tie, check your pieces will end up the right length before sewing..

Then sew the lengths together in the middle.



Thread ribbon tie through the casings..



Tie in a bow to secure onto bun.



Quite simple really, although it took a bit of trial and error to find a method which (I hope) works..



the next morning: Here are the bun covers in action, they do work in principle, unfortunately my measurements were a little on the small side (either that or Cyan’s hair grew thicker overnight!), so they don’t quite stay put.. Another inch on the lengths I used would probably fix this.. whether it’s worth remaking them I don’t know.. or perhaps I’ll just ask my mum if she would crochet some for Cyan ;)

What do you think?



Brushing up on her alphabet before school this morning.. Thank you Aunty Arwen for the alphabet jigsaw puzzle birthday card ;) You can see the ribbon bow hair clips she picked to wear from those I made last night..