Grandma Ideas

I’ve decided that I have focused too much on the egg-ness of Easter. Now, it’s time to give the poor Easter bunny his fair share of the time.

So, I have found some directions and tutorials on how to make bunnies.

• DIY Stuffed Easter bunny has a pattern that you download for free, print on inkjet fabric or iron-on transfer paper, cut it out, sew it up, and stuff it. This is simple enough that a grandchild who is a beginning sewer could make. Cute, easy.
• Bunny pillow tutorial is for making a simple bunny and a pillow. I would change two things on this idea. First, it calls for making a slit in the back to stuff the bunny and then stitching it closed. I would rather leave a section of the seam open, turn it right side out, stuff it, and then stitch it closed on the seam. The second thing, I wouldn’t make a big pillow. I would just make a simple ‘pocket’ for the bunny to go in. I’d get two rectangle pieces of cloth, sew three sides to form a pocket, and then do a clean finish on the top edge. It would be fun to sew rick rack or lace on the pocket — if this were for a granddaughter. If it was for a grandson, I’d probably cut out a back pocket from a pair of Levis.
• The sitting rabbit pattern is very simple, too. To make it even easier, instead of hand embroidering the eyes, nose, and mouth, you could draw them on with a permanent marker or sew buttons on for the eyes and do a simple straight basting stitch for the nose and mouth.
• Ballet Bunny is another simple bunny to make. Again, if you don’t want to stitch on the face details, you could draw it with a marking pen. Just make sure you test the pen on a scrap of fabric before you sew it so you can see if the pen bleeds. (If it bleeds, the lines that you draw will not be distinct. The ink will ‘run’ and the lines will be blurry.)
• This mooshy bunny is made out of old t-shirts. Again, this is easy enough for a grandchild to sew. Great bonding time for you and your grandchild! (This is my second favorite bunny idea here.)
• And, my favorite bunny here is the Valentine bunny.  I think the person that made this bunny is just using it for decoration — and not for a child to play with. I think that if you make this, it should be so that your grandchild could play with it. She glued pom poms on for the eyes and the nose. She didn’t mention what type of glue that she used. If this bunny is for a young grandchild, I would probably sew on buttons for eyes instead of using pom poms (so the pom poms wouldn’t get pulled off). For older grandchildren, I would probably use a super glue or glue gun instead of a tacky glue or Elmer’s white glue.

Happy sewing!

One of my Internet grandma friends, Susan Adcox, told me about some Easter games that she wrote about on her site. They are great games that you can play with your grandchildren. What wonderful ideas!

I really loved her game The Wolf and the Eggs and also Steal the Egg. These would be a hit at your Easter activities with your grandchildren.

So, hurry over to her site and read all about her Kids’ Easter Egg Games. Then, be sure to play them with your grandchildren.

Thanks so much for sharing, Susan!

This morning as I was riding the bus to work, an idea popped into my head. It tap danced around my little grey cells and filled me with delight. (It’s not hard for ideas to delight me . . . ) I find it amazing that ideas come to me when I’m not focusing on or trying to come up with ideas. Sweet!

So, here it is: create a snazzy, decorative dry erase board for your grandchildren.

I know that you can purchase dry erase boards that are fairly inexpensive. I know because I have one. But that board is rather mundane. So white. Plain Jane. Regular. Not at all fun and exciting. No siree, Bob.

So here’s a way to have a dry erase board with pizazz, personality and all-around-appeal.

Get some Con-Tact (R) paper that has a design or pattern on in it. Designs and colors are more exciting than a white board. But remember, you don’t want a really busy design because then your wouldn’t be able to see what your little grand-Rembrandt had drawn.

The sample shown here on the left is from Chic Shelf Paper. I think that this would be a fun pattern to use. Chic Shelf Paper has TONS of designs to choose from.

However, their cheetah, zebra, or tiger skin print might be a tad too wild . . . 

So here’s the idea.

Get some contact paper with a fun design. Put some on a wall at an appropriate height for your grandchildren. Give them a couple of dry erase markers and let them go to town writing and drawing to their heart’s content. This is a ‘legal’ way to draw on the walls!

Or, you can put some contact paper on the bottom of  your fridge door as a place for their artistic endeavors.

Or, find an old table for children at a thrift store. Cover the top with the contact paper and let them draw on it.

If you don’t like the idea of letting them write on your wall (even though it is protected by the contact paper), you could cover a large piece of cardboard and let your grandchildren use that.

You could cover pastel colored card stock or poster board with clear contact paper and this could be your grandchild’s personal dry erase board.

You can cover both sides of several pages of scrapbooking paper with clear contact paper. Punch some holes along one side and put them in a binder. Get a plastic pocket to keep the dry erase markers and an old wash cloth for an eraser and give it to your grandchild. If they live far away from you, they can draw on it while they are traveling to get to your house for a visit.

There’s also some chalkboard Con-Tact(R) paper that sells for around $8.50. With this product, you can turn any surface into a chalkboard.

Hope you have fun making a decorative dry erase board for your grandchildren!

Grandpa and I just HAD to drop in and see our new little grandson. And I’m glad we did.  I saw a fabulous Easter egg idea.

Our niece purchased some ‘jewel’ Easter eggs from Target. Then, she went to Michael’s craft store and bought some small battery-powered LED lights. (She found them in the section with bridal stuff.) She put a light in each egg. When the light was turned on, it glowed through the egg and looked really cool. She gave a bucket of these eggs to our grandson.  What a kind niece!

Here’s a picture of some of the eggs.

Here is a picture of what the little LED lights look like.



And here are some pictures of my cute grandson with an Easter egg. Actually, only half of an Easter egg . . .

Wouldn’t it be fun to have an Easter egg hunt in the dark for older grandchildren? After they found their lighted eggs, you could have an egg rolling contest to see who could roll their lighted egg the fastest from a starting line to the finish line. Of course doing it in the dark.

You could play catch with the lighted eggs.

You could do a towel toss where two grandchildren hold the edges of a towel and toss a lighted egg to another set of grandchildren holding a towel. (This is like a water balloon toss.)

You can play Duck, Duck, Goose and use a lighted egg instead of a handkerchief. (Duck, Duck, Goose is basically a game of tag where everybody sits in a circle facing inwards. One grandchild is selected to be IT. IT takes the lighted egg and goes around the outside of the circle lightly tapping each grandchild on the head saying, “Duck, duck, duck . . .” When he says “Goose,” he drops the egg behind that grandchild and runs around the circle. The other grandchild picks up the egg and chases after IT trying to tag IT before IT makes it around the circle and into the spot vacated by the ‘goose.’ If IT is tagged by the goose, he stays IT and goes around tapping grandchildren again. If the goose can’t catch IT, he becomes IT.)

Play freeze tag. One grandchild is IT. When IT tags another grandchild, that grandchild freezes and stays frozen until another grandchild touches him with a lighted Easter egg.

What other activities could you do with a lighted Easter egg??