Is your work space uber neat or uber not?

Theyre very easy to make. But I have learnt one thing: make a small hole in the middle of the bead before cooking that way when they expand they dont crack on the outside they expand into that hole. Then drill them, make more than you need as you’ll loose a few. I used an M6 drill bit…

So make salt dough. 1 cup salt, 1 cup flour, 1/2 cup water. Roll into bead shapes. MAKE HOLE IN CENTRE! Stick in oven for a few hours on a low heat. When cooled drill. Then paint and doodle on.

We bought a plastic jar (toddler safe!) made a lable added laces and da da pressie to love!

Brown bag crown.

Chop bottom off brown paper bag. Fold down and down until it looks like a reath.
Cut circles from tissue paper, dollies, whatever you have. Get kids.to stick them together.to make flowers. When you have 10 or so flowers stick them to your crown.

And ta da. A beautiful May day crown. Lovely girl loved this so much we will certainly be doing lots more flowers!!

Ta da salt dough threading beads. Gotta say these are a huge hit!

Meanwhile lovely girl and I have been doing yet more storytelling and slowly but surely Im building up all Characters and props from our fav stories… Heres a few:

This is rapunzel in her tower – with the prince (so its a felt girl, packing tube and paper doillie, alongside Grandad from the dolls house with his Knight gear on)

Well I thought if Grandad is a Knight Grandma should also be then they can duel!

Little red riding hood cape

Witches cape. Because theres always a witch!

Ill explain how each ones made and what other storytelling goodies we got next…

And as mayday came and went ww changed our nature table from spring to summer:

Drink the champ. Save to cork. Add red paint, white paint and coat in mod podge. And you’ve got toadstools. Perfect for fairy gardens!

I painted the drawers with left over paint. Added a shelf from scraps and glued fabric to the back and kick boards. Add a few jars of pasta and beans and dadaaa kitchen.

I must say its now instantly Lovely Girls fav place to hang out – and between that and the shop perhaps I’ll get to spend enough time in the kitchen to try out a few new reciepes!! Happy days.

So what might you ask have I learnt this week. Well, dear reader, I have learnt that when lovely girl gets cross – which is when I ask her to do something she doesn’t want to – because she is tired (shes given up napping, fear of missing anything) she goes straight for destruction. This was crystalised for me at a friends house; when lovely girl ripped up some flowers because I had said we had to go home.

After the immedate reactions and apologies I think its important to really gain a lesson and try to reason out thiz behaviour – well and equip lovely girl with tools to deal with anger – not just braking something.

So to try to teach lovely girl in a positive way – this morning we went out to the garden centre and bought some plants to make a fairy garden.

It was a totally lovely project and great fun. Then at lunch whilst looking at our lovely fairy garden we talked about how upsetting it is to destroy stuff and how we must care for plants and people. Has it gone in? Well – a little – I think… At least giving it a bit more practical grounding for lovely girl to try  undersrand it all… And we get a cute fairy garden too…

More things will be going in the fairy garden… Stay tuned…