20+ Crafty Back-to-School Supplies

This year give your school supplies your own personal twist with these school supply craft ideas perfect for back-to-school.

Flower-trimmed basket

Source:  Womans Day www.womansday.com

MATERIALS

Pink and yellow tissue paper

Pencil

Ruler

Scissors

5 twist-ties

Paper-shredding scissors (optional)

2 shades of green crepe paper streamers

Wicker basket ($10; Michaels.com)

Hot-glue gun and glue sticks

1. For pink flowers: Cut six 6″ squares of pink tissue paper and stack them. Starting at one edge of stack, fold up ½”, then under ½”; continue until entire stack is folded accordion-style. Wrap a twist-tie around the middle. Round off both ends with scissors, then fluff out the folds. Repeat for second flower.

2. For yellow flowers: Make fringe as in the illustration (right), but cut a 2″ rather than a 1″ strip and make your fringe cuts 1″ deep. Roll up the unfolded strip tightly and secure end with glue; let dry. Fluff out fringes. Repeat for 4 more flowers.

3.  Cut one length of each color green streamer to circumference of basket. Make cuts halfway into each streamer, ¼” apart, to make fringe. Hot-glue unfringed side of one streamer onto top edge of basket. Repeat with second streamer.

4. Cut a long piece of streamer in half lengthwise. Hot-glue one half to base of handle, wrap it around handle and glue on opposite side; trim excess paper. Hot-glue individual pink and clusters of 2 or 3 yellow flowers to handle; let dry.

Photo Credit: Lucas Allen/Woman’s Day

To Make Fringe: Step 1

Fold a sheet of tissue paper so it’s half the length, then repeat 3 times to get a narrow rectangle.

Photo Credit: Lucas Allen/Woman’s Day

To Make Fringe: Step 2

Cut a 1″ strip off a short end. Keeping it folded, make ½”-deep cuts every ¼” along bottom (paper-shredding scissors will make this go faster). Repeat the process with the rest of the paper. Unfold strip

Photo Credit: Lucas Allen/Woman’s Day

Easter Eggs: Grandpa Egg

Source: familyfun.go.com

With his paper tube body and glued-on features, this egghead family member will crack your kids up.

Want to make the entire egghead family? Find instructions for the rest of the clan at our Easter egg decorating party.

Materials

• Brown and white hard-boiled eggs
• toilet paper tubes
• construction paper
• glue sticks
• scissors

• yarn
• ribbon
• googly eyes
• pom poms
• markers

 

Total Time Needed: 1 Hour

Instructions

1. Craft Cardboard Body: Collect toilet paper tubes, construction paper, glue sticks, and kids’ scissors and arrange them on one end of the table. Invite your kids to make the bodies. First, help them cut the tubes to a desired height, then wrap a construction paper rectangle around the tube and glue in place. Next, cut and glue on paper arms, ears, and accessories.
2. Glue on Face: Have kids pick and choose facial features from various craft supplies, such as colored paper cutouts, cotton balls, yarn, ribbon, pom-poms, googly eyes, and stickers (for easy access and simple sorting, we packed all the supplies in a large muffin tin). They can then use glue or double-sided tape to attach the features to the eggs. Dress Grandpa in a paper sport coat with marker lapels, buttons, and pocket. Give him wild hair and a mustache by gluing on cotton balls.
3. Finishing Touches: To complete the egghead, place the egg on top of the tube body. Add any finishing touches with permanent marker, such as eyes, noses, rosy cheeks, and freckles.

DIY Houses by Night

Source/Photo Credit: fellowfellow.com –  by ffadmin – Reposted with permission

Ready for a bit of DIY love? 🙂
 

A little town at night.. isn’t it sweet?!

There are a few tricks to making this DIY a success, all to do with finding the perfect image.

1. What you’re looking for is a picture of a house/castle/building that’s taken front-on (perspective works, but not as well). You could take it from your favourite magazine, an old calendar, or even print some from the internet. Up to you! In fact, you could even print a photo of your house if you have one!
2. The print needs to have a bit of space either side of the house to wrap around to the back of the votive.
3. It’s best to choose a picture that is higher in the middle than at the sides, and sides that are about the same height.
4. Choose a house that has some windows visible.
5. If possible, find a picture that has nothing printed on the back. If you can’t, not to worry – it could add a nice effect (like mine did)!

I was lucky enough to have found some old photo books at a market in Germany that hold some of the coolest black and white photos from the War era.. perfect for a project like this one!

Here’s what you’ll need:

Step 1: You want to start cutting and finish cutting at around the same height on either side of your picture. Use the scissors to cut straight in to where your house begins, cut around the top of the house, and cut straight back out to the edge at around the same height as you cut in. Make sense? Maybe this will help:

Step 2: Trim away any other areas you don’t want, but don’t trim the sides yet.
Step 3: Using your Xacto knife and a cutting mat, carefully cut out any windows you want the light to shine through. I found at this stage (because my paper was a bit fragile) it was easiest to press the knife in, rather than drag it.

Step 4: Wrap the image into a cylinder (size is up to you) and sticky tape it together. Trim around the top if it doesn’t quite match, as well as any excess where you joined it.
Step 5: Add your battery operated tea light, and wait until it gets dark!

Note: Because paper (of course) is highly flammable, the use of battery operated candles over real ones is imperative. However, if you would rather use real candles, try wrapping the image around the outside of a small glass jar and use that to hold your candle (but still keep an eye on it) 🙂