The play mat was really easy to make, because I let my mom do all the sewing. ha. (I figured it was her fabric, and I didn’t want to mess it up.) Anyway, it’s a big hit. E is really enjoying it. I also think it would be great across the foot of a bed, or even just hanging on the wall. Either way, it will be a fun thing to have around. Thanks mom!

We used some cotton batting to make the mat a bit softer. The printed fabric is face down on top, then the back panel of fabric is face up under that. And the batting is on the bottom. Then we (I mean my mom), sewed around the edges, leaving some un-sewn, so it could be turned right-side out. I also learned about the trick of cutting the corners a bit, so they turn out more square. (See photo below.)

Here is a shot of me and my camera assistant. Nice!

It seems like we’re always in the need of more kids activities for restaurants and travel. Shortly after I made Paper City Paris, I wondered what a miniature version would look like. Finally, this week I had the time to try it out. It was really fun redesigning and simplifying the folds and structures. For example, the people in this set are so small that I just made them into single strips of paper that bend in half. It ends up being even easier to make than the original. It’s also quite handy to have the entire set print out on only one sheet of paper. Great for larger groups of crafting kids. And when you’re all done, you can fit all of Paris into a mint tin, so it can be stowed in a pocket or bag.

Happy traveling, and amusez-vous bien!

Click on the template below, then print. (I printed on matte photo paper, but any paper works great.)

Today it was decided that we needed more people for the dollhouse, so I got out some scrap wood and had the kids draw figures on the pieces. Then I took my woodburner and traced over their drawings and made some “doll blocks”. It was so fast and fun that I had to try making a drawing, too. The dolls really helped spice up the doll house, and the kids had a great time acting out scenes with the characters they made. I also wood burned their names and the date on the bottom of the blocks too, in case they get saved.

If you’ve never tried wood burning, you should give it a whirl. Woodburners and very inexpensive, and it’s a great non-toxic way to decorate wood toys. (You can find out more about woodburner tools on my Favorite Tools page if you’d like.) You could also just draw or paint on the blocks too, which would also be great.

Happy Holidays!

Last night I got out my paper scraps and glue to make a collage gift card for my friend’s birthday party. (He loves Datsun 510 wagons.) And once my kids saw what I was doing, they wanted to join in, too. So I gave them a piece of paper and let them dig through my box of scraps. They were so focussed: searching through the scraps, cutting pieces out, gluing them down, and drawing. Some old turkey craft leftovers were found too, and when those ran out, my son started drawing his own turkeys into his collage. The project kept them busy for a long time, and they ended up with amazing pieces of art. If your kids like stickers, collage can be a fun, creative alternative. Also, a lot less expensive.

I find that stick glue works best. For paper, we used magazine clippings, shopping bags, old painted paper, and whatever else we could find. Give it a try if you’d like!

Happy collaging!

We’re already drawing up plans for additional wooden knight accessories, including a launching catapult for the arm, and a bouquet of flowers for the Queen as a peaceful sword substitute. Nice.

By Wendi Gratz

(Giveaway info below to win these bags!)

Hello again everyone! Way back in July I posted here about some basic info you need to start embroidering – and I shared some of the details about how I stitched up one of Joel’s Paper City designs. As soon as I saw Joel’s holiday designs on printable gift tags. I knew I wanted to stitch them on some little gift bags. Joel gave me permission – so here I am with another embroidery tutorial. :-)

First off, you’ll need the free Goody Bag pattern. You can download the PDF pattern here.

You’ll want the images so that they pretty much fill the face of a goody bag. (No wider than 4 inches, and no taller than 2 1/2 inches.) Joel has created a new template in which the images are already resized for you. Just click on the image below, then print.

Next up, you’ll need to transfer the image onto the fabric. I used a medium-weight twill. I couldn’t see through it well enough to trace the design with a pencil, so I used an iron-on transfer pen. You can watch a video showing you how to do that here.

Transferring the image isn’t difficult – the trick is knowing exactly where to place it. The pattern calls for you to use two fabric rectangles – one for the front of the bag and one for the back. The edges of those rectangles will wrap around to form the sides and bottom of the bag. You want to make sure to position your embroidery so that it’s centered on the front of the finished bag. First, fold the rectangle of fabric in half the long way and mark the center with a pin. That will show you the vertical center line. Now – measure up 2 inches from the bottom of the rectangle. Place the bottom of your design so that it rests on this line. (See photo below of the bag before it was sewn. There is more fabric than you might expect showing around the edges of the embroidered image.)

Now stitch your design. I backstitched everything in white thread (There’s a video tutorial for that stitch here.) For almost all the designs I used three strands of embroidery thread. I used just two strands for the tiny packages under the Christmas tree, and for the entire Santa-Driving-the-Sleigh design.

These would be a really fun project to work on with kids – especially the simpler designs like the hat, the bells, the sleigh, and the snowman. I definitely don’t recommend the Santa-with-Sleigh design for beginners of any age. That was some fussy stitching! :-)

Happy stitching everyone!

Best,
Wendi

Giveaway info!
Hey everyone. Joel here. Wendy has very kindly offered to give away these two sets gift bags!

Leave a comment on this post to try and win one set!
Leave a comment on Wendi’s blog here, to try and win the other set!

The contest will end Saturday morning. Then we will randomly select the winners and notify you.

Joel

UPDATE: THE CONTEST IS FINISHED. Cath is the randomly selected winner! Congratulations!

Here are the dollhouses I brought to New York for the show.

Happy Holidays!

Templates: Click on the images, then print. (To get other Dressy Cat printouts, click here.)

Update: Here is a great video with a fabulous song from Dressy Cat fan, Michelle. Awesome Michelle! Thanks for letting us share the video here!

Caroling is Catching!

As a music teacher, I often find myself inviting people over to perform or participate in some kind of music. One of my best memories is a Richard Rodgers Centennial celebration back in 2002 in which guests were instructed to BYOP: Bring your own performance of a Richard Rodgers piece. Joel brought two turntables and a drum machine for his yodeling hip-hop arrangement of “The Lonely Goatherd”. But that’s a story for another day.

One of our favorite musical gatherings is just around the corner ~ our yearly caroling party. We’ve been doing it for years now, and with trial and error we’ve gotten it down to a science. The first year we did it, our son was the tiniest guy on the block. My husband and I thought it would be fun for him to experience a house full of people joyfully singing, so we packed the whole neighborhood into our living room. We handed out lyric sheets to the adults and percussion instruments to the pre-reading kids. I hadn’t yet learned to sift out the louder percussion instruments, and the kids were really going for it with those bells and whistles. Matt and I looked at each other laughingly, wondering if we were in over our heads…

Then the magic happened. Once we started singing our hearts out, they were caught up in the moment and really started getting into it. By the time we’d gotten through our lyric sheets and were ready for apple crisp, everyone was overflowing about how fun it was to sing in a group, and how long it had been since they’d done that. Basically, we were all transported back to childhood.

Here’s what we’ve learned over the years to help our caroling parties go smoothly:

1. Lyric Sheets ~ You can easily make your own using cut-and-paste with lyrics found online. The party flows well with minimal verses to each song, and we’ve noticed that repeating the first verse can help carolers build confidence. We include 12 songs in our lyric sheets, and sing as many as it seems people are in the mood to sing. Typically, we get through them all and leave people wishing for more. It’s always good to leave people wishing for more, I think.

2. Song Leader ~ When someone is singing his or her heart out in front of the group, the energy is catching! Even if it takes a couple minutes, it will happen.

3. Accompaniment ~ A pianist or guitarist is marvelous and probably the most available. And the more the merrier! Last year we added a violinist, and that was a real treat. As far as percussion goes, I’ve learned to hand out only the quietest of shakers so the singing will be the strongest sound in the room. And speaking of strong singing, if you find yourself without accompaniment and still want to have a caroling party, plan ahead for a song leader with a strong voice and a good sense of rhythm and go for it!

4. Diversity ~ My family celebrates Christmas, so the bulk of our caroling features Christmas songs. Since we’ve always had Hanukkah celebrators in our midst, we’ve enjoyed including Hanukkah songs as well. Last year we lucked out when one of the best Jewish music teachers in town, also a dear friend and student family, came with her guitar in hand. She really broadened our repertoire of Hanukkah songs, and it was a particularly rousing element of our party.

Over the years, we’ve also led caroling at various friends’ parties. Last year we joined a fervent group of Solstice-celebrators, and this year in addition to our own party we’re singing at three others, including our first time singing in an elder care home. Caroling together is unifying, and just plain fun. It’s a marvelous way to bring voices of all ages and paths together into a present moment of pure joy.

You who gravitate to Joel’s blog are all über-creative, and I look forward to hearing about your musical holiday traditions in the comments. Happy singing to you all this season!

This first one is some simple paper clip cutout toys. I just did an image search for dinosaurs and let my son pick out which ones he wanted to printout. Then he cut them out himself and we taped a bent paper clip to the backs of them so they could stand up. (See images below.) My daughter also drew a background which we stood up with bent paper clips. Finally, I tried to bend the shape of a T-Rex with some wire, and my son drew a head for it, which we taped on. Both of the kids really love playing with this set of paper toys and acting out exciting scenarios.

We’ve been having a great time searching and digging for “dinosaur bones” in the yard, then trying to put together an entire skeleton. Finding the pieces you need to complete the skeleton makes for quite an exciting scavenger hunt. Sometimes we have to go out on walks through the neighborhood or to the park so we can find the right one. Good outdoor fun!

I was really excited to discover this interactive dinosaur book from Me Books. (As always, this is not a paid advertisement). And the twins are both totally fascinated by it. You can touch a dinosaur and it makes the noise that the animal might have sounded like. You can also touch the words, and it will read the text aloud, which is my favorite part, because now I can finally pronounce all of the tricky dinosaur names with confidence! Sweet. Check it out here if you’d like.

Finally, it’s always great to just look at books or photos and get inspired to draw some dinosaurs on your own. Here are a couple drawings that my son did. One of them even for dad!

Hope you have some jurassic fun! Also, I’d love to hear about any dinosaur activities that you do, so feel free to leave a comment and share them!

My favorite home-town magazine, Portland Monthly, was very kind to do a review of Made to Play in their November issue. You can read a pdf of the article below if you’d like. Thanks Portland Monthly!

Click on the image below to read the article in PDF.

My kids love wrapping and decorating presents. So in preparation for the winter holidays, I thought it would be fun to make some gift tags that they could cut out or color. I also teamed up with Lisa Mundorff, who is a children’s book illustrator and very clever holiday card creator over at Dear Ida. She made some sweet tags that my kids wish they could eat. Nice!

Happy wrapping!

Click on the images below, then print.

My wife took the kids to see the Pinkalicious musical today here in Portland. My daughter had a pink dress all picked out, but my son realized he had nothing pink to wear. So we quickly made this paper necktie together with an old cover of an Art Forum Magazine. It was very fast to make. We cut out the main shape of the tie, then glued on some strips of paper for the stripes, and trimmed the edges off. Finally, we took a paper clip and bent it open very slightly, and just taped it to the back of the tie. He was really excited to wear it. We might have to make some more in different colors and patterns now. Fancy!

If any of you have ideas or tutorials for other ways to make neckties (for kids or grown-ups), Let me know in the comments. I’d love to see them. I remember stumbling across a cool homemade tie sewing pattern once that looked quite fun.

Making your own wrapping paper is eco friendly, budget friendly and kid friendly. This video tutorial (below) shows you how with easy to follow steps. I hope you enjoy this project!

Thanks for the amazing tutorial Phoebe!
Joel

Also, Phoebe’s elSage Etsy Shop is definitely worth checking out!

Happy reading!

So far she’s really having fun with the toy, and it holds her attention for quite a lot time. I have some directions below, if you’d like to try making one. It might even be a good holiday present.

Directions: (See images below.)

1 – Cut out two circles of fabric for the middle of the sun. (My circles were 5 inches in diameter.) Then cut out 7 rays, by folding some fabric in half, and cutting a long triangle shape. (My rays were about 7 inches in length.)
2 – Fold each ray in half, right side facing in, and sew up the side.
3 – Now turn the rays right-side out. (I used an end of one of my paint brushes to help with this.)
4 – I noticed most baby toys like this have knots in the end, for babies to suck on, and they’re right. (At least my kids like them.) So tie a knot in the end of each ray, if you’d like.

5 – Sew on a circle of velcro in the middle of each circle piece. (Sew on the right side of the fabric.) Then sew the end of each ray, one at a time, to one of the circles. When doing this, sew the rays on the right side of the fabric, and also sew the rays so that they’re pointing to the inside of the circle. (Then later, when you turn it right-side out, they’ll be pointing out.)
6 – Now place the other circle on top of the other circle, right side facing in, and sew around the edge, leaving about an inch un-sewn.
7 – Turn the circle right-side out, and tuck in some crinkle paper if you’d like. (I used a sun chip bag, but I’ve heard that diaper wipe bags work well too.)
8 – Then hand sew the opening shut. Done!

I put her on my lap while turning the rays right-side out, and it was so cute how fascinated she was. Maybe she already knew it was going to be for her.

And the winners, according to the random generator are Denise, and Kirsty! Thanks so much everyone for the enthusiastic response! I’ll definitely try to do another giveaway before the winter holidays.

Also, so everyone can get a little something, below is a new coloring sheet that I just made this morning. Thanks again for playing!

Click on the image below, then print.