Teach Me Tuesday Archives - Mine for the Making

Non-Candy Egg Fillers for Under $10

March 31, 2015 Leave a Comment

Hi Mine for the Making lovelies! Michelle again from Delicate Construction and today I thought I would share how I filled all of the plastic eggs I needed for Avery’s egg hunt for under $10! If that wasn’t cool enough, what if I told you there was no candy involved?! I got your attention now right? Check out these Non-Candy Egg Fillers for Under $10!

My biggest secret? My favorite place, and I am sure yours as well, the Target One Spot! The dollar store would also be a great option but basically I was looking for anything that had multiple items in the package for a dollar. I found lots of great things like small rings, erasers, pens, tape, hair clips and stickers in all of her favorite characters.

When it came to filling the eggs, I just broke everything up into singles and got to work! Things like the erasers I put a few at a time in but the barrettes and such were just one per egg.

The stickers I cut into strips and maneuvered around all of the character so I could get about 4 strips from each sheet.

Once they were all cut, I just rolled them up and stuck them in their own egg as well! Super simple and this one got a huge bang for the buck!

I can’t wait until Sunday when Avery gets to go on her hunt! She is going to have a blast! Bonus points that I won’t have to have extra candy in the house tempting her or me!

Hope you have a Happy Easter!

Michelle {Delicate Construction}

Filed Under: contributor, easter, kid-friendly, motherhood, Teach Me Tuesday, tips

Shamrock Math for Kids

February 25, 2015 Leave a Comment

Hi Makers! Michelle here from Delicate Construction and I am back to share a quick and easy math idea with some free printables just in time for some St. Patrick’s Day fun! Check out this hands-on math idea- Shamrock Math for Kids! These 2 math activities and printables are perfect for kids preschool-2nd grade.

I love when I am at the store and I am able to find fun holiday stickers and such on sale or clearance because I know that if I have them, math is much more fun and interesting for my daughter. That is why I had to have these fun St. Patty’s stickers from Joann!

I know that my preschooler is starting to become interested and working on addition and patterns so I made a couple of printables for her to practice! I love making printables and sharing them with all of you!

For the patterns printable, I started most of the first pattern for her, and then allowed her to finish it. If your child is older (1st-2nd grade) they can make their own patterns using the stickers.

My preschooler got a kick out of this pattern activity which means I may have to make some longer rows so we can work on more challenging patterns! We worked on the ABAB pattern, but older children can definitely explore other patterns.

The addition printable was also a great opportunity to not only count and add but work on writing the numbers as well. I would model the first addition sentence for my preschooler, then allow her to complete the second one on her own. You can laminate this printable so and have your child use a dry erase marker so that you can get multiple uses out of it!

In the end I accomplished exactly what I wanted. We had fun working on some math concepts, but she was engaged and actively learning the whole time. If you don’t have stickers, I thought that it would also be fun to get some Lucky Charms or other cereal to go along with this theme as well- then it is snack too!

These two printables can be downloaded for personal use- Addition is HERE and Patterns is HERE. And for other holidays, bust out some themed stickers/foamies to continue to use these prints.

Thanks for stopping by today!

Michelle {Delicate Construction}

Filed Under: contributor, educational, kid-friendly, print, printable, st. patrick's day, Teach Me Tuesday

Teach Me Tuesday: Olaf Snow Globe

December 23, 2014 1 Comment

Hi there friends! Only a couple days until Christmas…I can hardly believe it! In case you are looking for a fun winter craft or a quick gift your kiddos can make for their friends, you will love today’s post. Michelle, our Kids Crafts contributor, is back today to share the sweetest winter kiddo craft. Check out this Olaf Snow Globe! If you have a Frozen crazed kid like I do, they are bound to love this one!

Can you believe that we are right smack in the middle of the holidays?? Nothing is more amazing and stressful than the holidays and this is for sure a time that you want to keep those kids busy and amused so you can get some secret work accomplished! This is a great, quick and easy project that older kids can easily do with young kids and younger kids will get a kick out of for a while- Avery loves hers! Check out our new Olaf snow-globe!

This started in two ways, first I found these fun fill-able snow globes for half off at Michael’s, super fun but any jar would work great for this too. I just liked this one because it was plastic and round.

The second piece to this puzzle was found while cleaning Avery’s classroom, I was putting stuff away and located one of her MANY Olaf figures and I thought that she would love that in the snow-globe and it is obviously out of the current toy rotation so we can pretend I just picked it up for just such an occasion. Once you have your items for the inside of the snow-globe, you just want to hot glue them inside the lid. An adult or much older child (like teen) should do this step.

After that, I handed over the top to Avery and a few different glitter options to throw inside, natuarlly because she is my daughter, she chose them all. Good girl.

I had a finer glitter, a bigger glitter and some snowflake sequins- all of them went in and I am pretty sure that she enjoyed this part!

After that, add water and you are done! Time to glue on the lid and for this you can easily use a glue like E600 that takes longer to dry, just make sure it doesn’t get on the outside so that it can be played with immediately!

Thanks Kara for letting me come over again today!

Michelle {Delicate Construction}

Filed Under: contributor, crafts, Disney, FROZEN, kid-friendly, Teach Me Tuesday

Teach Me Tuesday: I’m Thankful Table Runner

November 11, 2014 2 Comments

Happy Veteran’s Day friends and welcome to Teach Me Tuesday! A (mostly) weekly series where we share all things kid-friendly that you can do with your kids or teach them how to do. It can be educational, artistic, scientific, hands-on…anything goes as long as it’s kid approved! Today, our kid crafts contributor, Michelle, is sharing a sweet and meaningful Thanksgiving craft to do with the kiddos! I am LOVING her I’m Thankful Table Runner idea! It’s perfect for Thanksgiving!

Hello Mine for the Making lovelies! It is Michelle from Delicate Construction back with another kid craft for you all! We are officially in my favorite time of year- I love November and December and all the holidays, festivities and get togethers during this time. With Thanksgiving coming up first, I thought it would be fun to create a table runner with one of the things I am most grateful for- my daughter.

This is a super simple project and I like to make table runners each year, but now that Avery is writing, I have to have her get involved. I love her writing and have to save this now for years to come. First things first, you need a table runner. Normally I make these and just sew them with whatever fabric, canvas or drop cloth I have on hand but this year I bought one. It says $10 but it was on sale so I think I got it for $7 and it was totally worth the time it saved me.

Next, I grabbed some paper so that I could write the words and Avery could copy them and some fall colored permanent markers.

Once I had those three things, we were ready to get writing! We started with family of course and as soon as we wrote that, I knew I had to also document the way she draws people. It is so sweet and I know I will be breaking this out each year!

It was so fun watching her write everything but it was also great practice as well! She is learning so much so fast!

After she was done writing (it would have been a lot for her to do all on her own) I filled in with some additional things that she helped brainstorm and we finished it out! I hope you have fun with this one and create a keepsake for your family!

If you are looking for some more holiday inspiration, check out my Delicately Constructed Holiday series running jointly on my blog and You Tube Channel. You can check out the first episode HERE!

Michelle

Filed Under: contributor, holidays, kid-friendly, Teach Me Tuesday, thankful, thanksgiving, tutorial

Teach Me Tuesday: Jack-o-Lantern Game

October 21, 2014 Leave a Comment

Welcome to Teach Me Tuesday! A (mostly) weekly series where we share all things kid-friendly that you can do with your kids or teach them how to do. It can be educational, artistic, scientific, hands-on…anything goes as long as it’s kid approved! Today, our kid-friendly contributor is sharing a fun game your little pumpkins will love!

Hi Friends of Kara!! Michelle from Delicate Construction here. Can you believe that it is already October? I surely can’t, but it is, so let’s embrace it with a fun and easy preschool Jack-o-Lantern Game!

All you need for this is orange (4 sheets), black (1 sheet) and brown (1 sheet) felt, some hot glue, pillow fluff and a wooden cube. All easy stuff that you can find at the craft store! First, take the four sheets of orange felt and cut a pumpkin shape out of them as big as you can.

Then cut one stem out of the brown that you will sandwich between the two orange pumpkin shapes.

Glue the stem between the two layers and then glue around the orange pumpkins to attach them together pillow style. Leave an opening at the bottom.

Fill it up with your pillow fluff.

Then, use the hot glue to close up the opening so you essentially have two pumpkin pillows.

Now it is time to put make the face pieces! These are all cut out of black felt and really I just wanted to have 6 different shapes so that there was something for each side of the wooden cube or dice. These don’t get glued to the pumpkin because this is going to be a reusable game.

After all you face pieces are created, each shape goes on each side of the wooden cube that will become your dice for the game. After drawing on the shapes, I also drew on the edges because I thought it looked a little more fun! You don’t have to.

Now you are ready to play the game! Basically it is designed so one child rolls the dice and then adds that piece to their jack-o-lantern, and then the next child goes. This goes back and forth until someone has a whole jack-o-lantern face. You can decide if the eye need to be the same shape which may help the game go a little faster. Also fun, you can make as many of the pumpkin and face pieces as you need for your group for not much more money!

What games do you like to play for Halloween?

Filed Under: contributor, fall, felt, games, halloween, kid-friendly, Teach Me Tuesday, tutorial Tagged With: halloween game

Teach Me Tuesday: Learning Through Games

September 30, 2014 23 Comments

I was provided with a product to review from ThinkFun. All ideas and opinions are my own.

Welcome to Teach Me Tuesday! A (mostly) weekly series where we share all things kid-friendly that you can do with your kids or teach them how to do. It can be educational, artistic, scientific, hands-on…anything goes as long as it’s kid approved! Today I’m going to be sharing how learning through games is not only fun for kids, but it’s super engaging. And let’s face it… if you are having fun while you are learning, you will more likely retain the information.

As a former elementary school teacher, it is safe for me to say that there are a TON of different learning styles. But it is also safe to say that most kids are willing to learn anything that involves FUN or a GAME of some kind. Now at home and homeschooling my daughter, I have found that whether I am teaching my daughter new concepts or reviewing old concepts, educational games are often times my go-to answer. Sometimes I make up the game myself, and other times I’m lucky enough to find a game that relates to whatever we are learning.

One of my favorite resources for educational games is ThinkFun. They offer a variety of educational games for different grade levels and they also offer teacher resources and game bundles. Recently my daughter and I played the Robot Turtles Board Game, the first board game for little programers. That’s right. A board game that teaches computer programming early on to kiddos.

The coolest part ever is that this game was designed by a dad (and computer software entrepreneur) for his 4 year old twins. It’s super kid-friendly, colorful, and fun. Through simple commands, kids learn what it means to write code, debug and use functions. Something even I can learn!

Robot Turtles Board Game allows the kids to be the programmers (who have all the control) of the computer, which is the parent. Yes, parents, you play too!

My other favorite part about this game is that it advances as your child does. So you can start this board game with your 4 year old, but expect to play for years to come as they advance and understand more about computer programming through playing Robot Turtles.

I also love that this game encourages the entire family to get involved. Kids of all ages and parents alike are all about to spend family time together, having fun and being silly all while learning. I’m thinking that’s a win folks!

You can find Turtle Robots at Target and on Amazon. And you can also enter the giveaway below to win your own Turtle Robots Board Game! Think… early Christmas ‘shopping!’

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Giveaway is open to US residents 18 years or older. Giveaway closes in one week and the winner will be notified. Good luck and thank you for entering!

Filed Under: educational, games, giveaway, kid-friendly, Teach Me Tuesday

Teach Me Tuesday: Fall Leaf Mobile

September 9, 2014 Leave a Comment

Welcome to Teach Me Tuesday! A (mostly) weekly series where we share all things kid-friendly that you can do with your kids or teach them how to do. It can be educational, artistic, scientific, hands-on…anything goes as long as it’s kid approved! Michelle of Delicate Construction is back and getting us ready for autumn! She’s sharing a tutorial for a fun craft the kids will love… a Fall Leaf Mobile!

Hello all! Michelle from Delicate Construction again and aren’t you so excited it is fall??? Ok, maybe not technically yet, and here in San Diego it certainly doesn’t feel like it at all, but I can dream, can’t I? Either way, it is time to get to some fall crafting with the kids and the best part is, if we do it now, we can enjoy it or months! Check out this awesome leaf mobile!

Isn’t it fun? I love how it looks and it was super easy to put together. As a teacher and a mom, I am a fan of letting children participate in open ended art projects that I turn into something else so for this one I just let the children paint with liquid water colors in fall colors on large coffee filters. You can order these from various places, pick them up at restaurant supply stores, or just use regular coffee filters. Out of the big one I got quite a few leaves, from the smaller ones you would just get one and that is fine too- you just get to paint more!

Once they are dried, I cut simple leaf shapes out of the filters, I love all the colors and variation of them all!

Then I covered them in contact paper, I was thinking of laminating them but I had the contact paper nearby so I went with that. Either will work great and it is always nice to have options.

After that, all that was left was to draw on some leaf veins! We collected a couple of leaves and explored the lines on the back and recreated them in our leaves with a sharpie. It is just that little extra detail that gives it an extra touch. I tied them with twine onto a cardboard tube I had but you could use a branch, that would look great as well!

Also great about this project, is that it is something you could create and add to throughout the season! It would also be fun to add in some real leaves as well too! I hope you liked this idea!

Filed Under: crafts, fall, kid-friendly, Teach Me Tuesday, tutorial

Teach Me Tuesday: 26+ Math Games for Kids

September 2, 2014 Leave a Comment

We’ve been having a lot of fun with math lately. My daughter has really taken a liking to it and I think some of it has to do with my approach in teaching her new concepts and reviewing concepts she’s previously been taught. Games are incorporated in a lot of our homeschooling, but especially with math. Pinterest is a great resource for educational ideas. I’ve rounded up 26+ Math Games for Kids in Kindergarten-third grade. Just click on the links below to get to the directions for each game or to download the freebies.

$26+ math games for kids.jpg$

Be sure to pin this list and check back as I will be adding to it as I find more fun math games for kiddos! Thanks for stopping by! If you want more educational ideas, check out my Homeschooling board and my Kiddo Stuff board on Pinterest.

I hope you come back by again tomorrow. I something really pretty to show you! Hint: it goes in my craft room.

Filed Under: educational, home school, round up, Teach Me Tuesday

Teach Me Tuesday: Marble Tracing Bags

August 26, 2014 2 Comments

Welcome to Teach Me Tuesday! A (mostly) weekly series where we share all things kid-friendly that you can do with your kids or teach them how to do. It can be educational, artistic, scientific, hands-on…anything goes as long as it’s kid approved! Today our Kids’ Activity Contributor, Michelle, is back to share Marble Tracing Bags!

Hi Mine for the Making friends! It is Michelle again from Delicate Construction and I have another fun kids activity! With back to school time coming, I wanted to share something that you could do with the little kids that is both fun and a great way to work on fine motor skills. My daughter Avery (age 4) had a blast with this and we did both letters and numbers but also had some fun with shapes as well. All you need are three things you may even have at the house, but if not, that you can grab at the dollar store and you are ready to go!

This is a super simple and versatile activity that can help with introduction, practice and review of the shapes of different numbers, letters and symbols for young children. I grabbed my hair gel and marbles at the dollar store and I had a 2 1⁄2 gallon bag at home. Normally I make these in gallon bags, but all I ended up having on hand was the 2 1⁄2 gallon bags and you know what, I think this is a fun size too because it allows for more tracing in their multiple symbols or shapes or even larger or more detailed designs.

I just opened up the bag, and since I had the large one, I added the whole bottle of gel. If you had one gallon bags you could use half the bottle and make two bags if you would like. At this point, I also added the food coloring or liquid watercolor, whatever you have on hand.

After that I added the marbles, same as the gel, I put the whole bag in but if you had gallon bags, just split it in half. These were also the flat sided marbles, I have done it with round ones as well and both work great.

Once you have everything in the bag, all you need to do is duct tape the top and you are ready to roll!

The way it works is you write the letter, number or shape on a piece of paper and place it under the bag.

Then the children maneuver the marbles in the bag to trace the shape, number or letter.

It not only helps with recognition, but it is also great for fine motor development as well when the little fingers are maneuvering the marbles around in the bag.

That is all for today! I hope this is something to use and I can’t wait to see you when I am back again next month with a fun fall craft!

Filed Under: contributor, educational, kid-friendly, Teach Me Tuesday, Uncategorized

Teach Me Tuesday: 25 of the Coolest Popsicle Stick Crafts

August 19, 2014 1 Comment

Hello there friends and welcome to Teach Me Tuesday… our *almost* weekly kid-centered post. I aim to make Teach Me Tuesdays a place where you can find teachable moments to share with your children.

One of my favorite craft items when I was younger was popsicle sticks, also known as craft sticks. I could spend hours making things with glue and popsicle sticks. So today I rounded up 25 of the Coolest Popsicle Stick Crafts to share with you and your kiddos. Just click on the links below to head to the original tutorials.

Who wants to get their hands on some popsicle sticks now?? So much fun! Not only did I use popsicle sticks a ton as a kid for crafting, but I used them a ton as a teacher! Puppets, reading sticks for tracking, bookmarks, place holders on our classroom library shelves… they are super handy!

Thanks for stopping by today friends! Feel free to PIN this post for later.

Filed Under: crafts, kid-friendly, round up, Teach Me Tuesday

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