Category Archives: how to make

Making Mondays – Tagxedo word art

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Always looking for ways to make easy art with the children – this site is a dream!

Instead of a simple word cloud, at Tagxedo.com you can choose from an astonishing array of shapes, and make real  ‘word art’.

tagxedo dog trudyktaylor blog4

  • Firstly, paste in your blog url, or text, or individual words.
  • Choose your shape. Hearts, elephants, bats – I even saw a witch’s hat in there!
  • Choose from a beautiful range of colour themes.
  • Even choose your fonts!
  • Then create, and save to jpg, or share on Facebook or Twitter.
  • They have a shop where you can buy mugs and stuff with your word picture on it.

I can see tons of uses for this:

  • A family word picture, with all our names on it.
  • For Father’s Day, the word ‘Dad’ repeated, and printed out to stick on a card.
  • For Valentine’s Day, the word ‘Love’, to stick on a card or frame and give to someone special.
  • Your child’s name, printed out to frame, maybe even print out 16 or 25 of them, each one in a different colour theme, in a smaller size, and then collage them together!
  • The words of a favourite poem or song.

The possibilities are endless!!!

These are the words it picked up from the blog.

Strangely, at some point I have used the words ‘sandwich’ and ‘rice’, which taken out of context seems a trifle odd! I’ve also used the word ‘really’ a lot more than I should. Happily, ‘Chocolate’ seems nice and emboldened, but where is ‘coffee’? This blog runs on coffee, yet no mention of it – strange…..perhaps it is my guilty little secret, only now revealed…

(Upon further investigation, I’ve uncovered ‘sandwich’ tins, ‘rice’ krispies – see, makes more sense now!)

Have you tried this? Can you think of any more uses for tagxedo?

Making Mondays – How to make a pet collage with your children

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We’re always on the look out for great craft projects, and when I saw the work of this artist Michel Keck, who produces amazing dog pop art, we just had to have a go.

The girls and I made…….. a collection of collaged Berties!

craft with kids, pet collageAnd for this craft, you’ll need all the usual scraps.

collage materials

  • Paper or material scraps – wrapping paper, scrapbooking paper, newspaper, even A4 lined paper can look good.
  • Stickers, glitter, beads – whatever you fancy.
  • PVA glue
  • Scissors
  • A4 photographs of your pet

Firstly, protect your work surfaces from all that glue.

Next, print out the pictures of your pet. You need a nice clear image. We printed the same picture three times, but flipped it in one picture, so Bertie was looking the opposite way. Make sure the eyes and the nose really stand out, because that’s all you’ll be able to see later!

bertie4Then get to work! Tear or cut pieces of your paper and stick onto the photo. You need to leave key areas clear, so that you’ll recognise your pet. With our collages, it was the eyes, nose, and floppy ears that stood out. And we all came up with our own unique versions!

bertie3bertie2bertie1These pictures are all on A4, and since I don’t have any good frames for that size (until my next trip to IKEA), I photographed each collage, changed the backgrounds in Photoshop,  then printed them out as 7″ x 5″ photos.

copiedAll of which fits nicely into the RIBBA frame.

ribbaLike so:

craft with kids, pet collage

It’s not a very messy craft, and I think the end results are really colourful and fun. When I get round to framing the originals, which have a lot more texture and variation, I’ll update this post with some more pictures.

Let me know if you try this with your own pet photo, and post a link to your site so other people can see too!

And I think our Berties might look better in a white Ribba frame….what do you reckon?

 

 

 

 

Cheat’s Pizza Cake – with Rice Krispies

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This cake is so easy to make, it feels like cheating! You can make it yourself, or let your children do it – it’s that simple!

Rice Krispie Cake

You will need:

  • A big sandwich cake tin, for getting a nice round shape, and some clingfilm or greaseproof paper to line it with.
  • Rice Krispie cake mixture (the kind made with marshmallow) OR  a real cheat – ready-made Rice Krispie Squares, the chewy marshmallow ones.
  • Strawberry or raspberry seedless jam
  • Sweets! I used Dolly Mixtures, Minstrels, Smarties and Jelly Tots. Anything goes, I guess – just not blue sweets….I’ve never seen anything blue on a pizza, and I’d be suspicious if I did!
  • Grated white chocolate.

Instructions

  1. Make your Rice Krispie mixture,  OR  if you’re using the ready-made Rice Krispie Squares, take them out of their packets, put them in a bowl and warm in the microwave for 15-30 seconds. This will make them all moist and pliable.
  2. Form your mixture into a pizza shape in your lined tin, pressing down firmly, and score into slices. Then cool in the fridge.   (Scoring into slices makes it easier to serve, and  the toppings don’t get destroyed by cutting it up later)
  3. Use seedless jam for tomato sauce, and a selection of sweets for toppings to decorate the base. I used Minstrels, Dolly Mixtures, Smarties and Jelly Tots.
  4. Finish with a grating of white chocolate, which looks amazingly like cheese.
  5. Serve it up, and soak up all that praise!

 

Making Mondays – Easy hamburger cupcakes

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As I’m trying to catch up on my Nanowrimo wordcount this weekend – an easy post for me – how to make hamburger cupcakes with the children.

These cupcakes are the quick and easy relation of those found online here at Bakerella. I once made the Bakerella version for a party, complete with fries in a little personalised holder, but for everyday……..

how to make hamburger cupcake

…..these little cakes are SO easy.

The ingredients:

  • Cupcakes, home made or store bought,
  • Green butter icing,
  • Yellow butter icing,
  • Seedless jam,
  • Jaffa cakes, or similar chocolate cookies.

how to make hamburger cupcakes

Remove your cupcakes from their cases, and slice in half. Spread icing on the base of the cake.

easy hamburger cakes

Place the Jaffa cake or cookie on the icing, and then top with more green icing (lettuce), yellow icing (mustard) and jam (ketchup).

easy hamburger cakesThen put the top of the burger on. SO EASY.

I don’t think they’re any healthier than the real thing, but children love sweet food masquerading as something else – especially if they can make it themselves!

Have fun with it!

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Making Mondays – how to make Tree Skeleton Art with the children.

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As Autumn turns colder, trees are beginning to reveal their starkly bare skeletons, and it’s surprisingly easy to make beautiful art based on these natural sculptures.

This picture was made by my daughter when she was 8.

bare tree, how to make bare tree art

Fun, effective, and you may already have the ‘ingredients’ in the house – the chief ingredient being children with lots of puff! Continue reading →