Bunchland

Catherine Romano blogs about crafty projects for kids and parents

This Halloween, we are planning a party. In addition to the usual spooky-themed loot bags and creepy looking desserts, I wanted to come up with a fun activity for parents and kids. Since we love to play dress-up (and I love to take pictures), I came up with a costume booth idea. The plan is to set up a designated area in my living room with costume pieces, a camera, and a photo printer.  Since the party isn’t happening until the weekend, I asked my little boy and husband to play the part of party goers for this post. Surprisingly, my little boy easily took on the role of a devil.

Take a look at what we did.

1. Set up the costume booth area.
2. Try on a few costumes.
3. Start snapping photos.
4. Print out the best photo, and voila, a special way to remember Halloween.  Read more...

Catherine Romano blogs about crafty projects for kids and parents

While searching for my son’s Halloween costume,  I stumbled upon a small black mask in the clearance section. At first glance, the mask looked very plain but I thought it would make for a great art project. I decided to make the purchase and asked my son to choose a few decorative materials.

Materials:

• Mask
• Decorative materials (My son chose these stickers because they looked like the buttons on a robot’s control panel. However, felt, pom-poms, feathers, and fabric flowers could also work well)

Process
1. Experiment with a sticker pattern.
2. Once you decide on a particular pattern, attach to the mask.
3. Edit any final details (i.e. cut edges of stickers along mask border).  Read more...

Catherine Romano blogs about crafty projects for kids and parents

Halloween is one of our favourite holidays. From choosing our costumes to gathering candy and decorating our home, we start planning early so we can spend most of October feeling festive.

This year, there is one little kink in our decorating plans. You see, we typically deck out our condo in an abundance of spooky themed stuff. But this year, our condo is on the real estate market, so we can’t turn our place into a haunted house for potential buyers. Instead, we opted for simple and understated decor. Take a look at one option.

Materials:

• Print out of Halloween themed images
• Adhesive tape
• Black marker
• X-acto knife
• Scissors

 Read more...

Catherine Romano blogs about crafty projects for kids and parents

I recently stumbled upon an old Thanksgiving photograph. In the snapshot, I was in third grade and wearing a turkey hat (and I actually remember making the hat in school).  With the festive holiday coming up, I thought it would be fun to recreate the hat for my son.  Take a look.

Materials:

• Construction paper
• Adhesive tape
• White glue
• Scissors

Process:
1.  Cut out a long strip of construction paper – this will be the headband for the turkey hat.
2.  Cut out the feathers and details for the turkey face.
3.  Attach all of the cut-outs and try the hat on for size.  Read more...

Catherine Romano blogs about crafty projects for kids and parents

With the holiday season quickly approaching (Thanksgiving, Halloween, American Thanksgiving, and a number of upcoming birthday parties), comes a great deal of excitement for our family. However, before the celebrating begins I often have to start menu planning.  You see, my son is allergic to eggs and peanuts, and this equates to me cooking and bringing his meals and snacks to most outings. I typically cook a very similar meal to what the host will be serving, so my son doesn’t feel excluded from the other guests. However, the one tricky part is dessert. First off, I am not a baker or pastry chef. I like to cook, but I find baking far more complicated and I lack the patience to wait for the treats to bake and cool. Also, most celebrations include elaborate desserts which are difficult to make.  Read more...

Catherine Romano blogs about crafty projects for kids and parents

My son recently started a preschool program and I wanted to send him off with something special. My mom used to leave little notes in our lunches – each note said something sweet and included a cute drawing (which was often of my cat). Since my boy is still too young to read mommy-notes, I went to the web to look for inspiration and stumbled upon these adorable pocket hearts.  I knew my son would love a heart tucked into his blue jean pocket, so I made a trip to the dollar store to collect materials and start the project.

Check it out.

My materials:

• Felt
• Needle
• Batting
• Scissors
• Embroidery thread

Here’s what I did:
1. Layer two sheets of felt on top of each other, and cut out a heart shape.
2. Thread the embroidery through the needle.  Read more...

Catherine Romano blogs about crafty projects for kids and parents

September in Toronto means more than back-to-school, it is also time for TIFF (Toronto International Film Festival). Even though TIFF films are not entirely kid-friendly, I still found a way to let my love of film inspire a new (and very simple) Make It! project.

Check it out, we made a flip book.

Flip books contain a series of images that gradually change on each successive page. When the pages are ‘flipped’ rapidly, the image appears to be moving. Making a flip book is quite simple and only requires a pen and few sheets of paper.

Process:
1.  Decide on the image you want to draw (I choose to animate a mad face to a happy face, and a static doll to a dancing doll)
2.  Starting from the last page in your note pad or post-it note, draw the first image.  Read more...