Lil J's 4th

We had a simple celebration for Lil J turning four over the weekend. I must be getting older, or perhaps we were rather tired out this month. Whatever the case, I realize our parties are getting simpler and simpler these days, but I guess sometimes simpler is better!  I initially wanted the bare minimum for the party (food, friends and cake), since we had just come back from Legoland, and I've been exhausted these days. 

However, Junior J got all excited about preparing for the party. The in-laws were visiting, and were all ready to string up decorations (they've been so used to helping to put up streamers and blowing balloons for our parties!). In the end, we managed to pull together a simple party, and got to celebrate and had a great time chatting with friends. The kids more or less played nicely together, even though I didn't plan for games this round. So I guess we more or less fulfilled our main objective of a birthday party: to celebrate a special little boy turning one year older, and fill the home with the laughter and chatter of loved ones gathering for a celebration.

This round, we had a rainbow theme for the backdrop, with our usual streamer "wall" and balloons, and birthday bunting. However, we tried using tissue paper (from Daiso, which comes in a pack of 25 sheets of 5 different colours) for the streamers instead of crepe paper. This proved to be a lot easier and faster to put up, since you just need to cut the paper into strips and hang them up sheet by sheet, instead of streamer by streamer. The birthday bunting was from Cotton On Kids (I bought it when it was on offer), and I love how the black lettering stands out against the streamers!

Again, we had our usual chalkboard birthday greeting. Lil J wanted a dinosaur party, which surprised us as he isn't too keen on dinosaurs unlike his brother. But we went with his request, so I drew in dinosaurs, and we had dino cake toppers and party packs.

For the party packs, we did something similar to what we prepared for Junior J's 6th: Kraft paper bags from Daiso with backgrounds painted by Junior J, and Perler bead tags (again, assembled by Junior J).

We filled them with crayons, stickers (both from Daiso), and some munchies.

Junior J started freaking out before the party, because he realized that I had randomly matched the dinosaurs to the bags. According to him, there were only volcanoes and flowers in the Cretaceous, so those paper bags with volcanoes and flowers painted on them had to have Cretaceous dinosaurs matched to them. So he sat down and made more dinosaur tags hours before the party, so that everything would be accurate. Thankfully, we managed to shuffle the dinos around and he only needed to make one more!

Food-wise, we catered a popiah and kueh pie ti set from Old Long House Popiah.

We also bought curry puffs, fishballs and other finger food from Old Chang Kee, and the in-laws helped to make konnyaku jelly and cut fruit.

The cake was one of Lil J's fav. He doesn't get to eat much store-bought cake, since he still has an egg allergy. We recently discovered that Cedele sells an eggless truffle cake, which is pretty yummy, so we bought one for the party. We dressed up the cake using Perler bead dinosaurs. Junior J made a dimetrodon for Lil J, as he said it was one of his brother's favourite prehistoric creatures. We couldn't find a bead template for that, so he created his own design!

All in all, it was a simple, homey affair. But one filled with fun, laughter and lots of love. :) Happy Birthday, my not so little Lil J!

PS: You can read all our party posts here. 

Survive the haze: 11 crafty activities to try

The haze has been keeping us indoors most of the time, since the boys start coughing and wheezing if they are exposed. Because of that, we've had more time to craft. I must say I quite enjoy our craft sessions these days since Baby J is happy messing with his crayons and dot-a-dot markers, while Lil J is now willing to follow instructions and not make a huge mess with the art materials. Junior J, as usual, loves painting and crafting, so he's more than happy to take part too!

I thought I'd compile a list of crafty activities that we've been doing the past 6 months, some which never got recorded on the blog (but shared on the FB page). You could try some of these at home with the kids when the PM2.5 levels shoot up. Have fun!

1. Spin Art: 
The boy have been loving their spinner (we purchased it here), especially Lil J who is particularly interested in the kinesthetic part of crafting. He loves cranking the button and squeezing the bottles, and seeing the paint splatter onto the paper, so I'd highly recommend this activity for kids who are more keen in the sensorial bit of art (smearing paint, working tools). Having the spinner means they get to see the painting process, however, you can also try this using a regular salad spinner, just that they won't be able to see the paint spread out as they spin the spinner.

2. Watercolour collages: 

We made this picture for the MIL recently, and now Lil J has been asking to try his hand at "dabbing". (You can read more details for this project here.) The older two enjoy experimenting with the paints, and watching how the paint spreads, and how the colours vary as they layer them. 

3 & 4. Washi-fied names & paint resist art:
We purchased these wooden alphabets from TYPO (you can also try cutting out alphabets using cardboard), and the older two had a field day covering them with washi tape! (Washi tape can be purchased from Daiso, various scrapbooking stores, and from MT Tape.)

The painting below the alphabets was made using the paint resist technique: Junior J drew the picture using a white oil pastel (you must draw the outline a couple of times and layer it thick), and then added the colours using watercolours. This works on paper, as well as canvas, and you can purchase canvases from Daiso or Art Friend.



5. Painting on canvas:
Junior J has tried using acrylics on canvas previously (the top two paintings were done with acrylic paints), but we stopped using these paints during this period because our windows were closed because of the haze, and I didn't want him breathing in too much of the paint fumes. However, poster paints work on canvas too, so we'll be exploring using those (the lower painting was done by Junior J using washi tapes and poster paints, when he was younger).



6. Ice-cream stick animals:
The kids in our co-op made these animals while exploring a farm theme, and they were quite easy to make! All you need are coloured ice-cream sticks (Daiso and Popular stock these), circle stickers (from Daiso), markers and coloured paper. The possibilities are endless, and you can add pompoms and googly eyes too!



7. Shape art: 
We experimented making pictures using shape cut-outs (we cut out shapes from construction paper) and circle stickers (these come in a few sizes in Daiso), after reading the book Wednesday, a sweet story about how a circle and square work together to form pictures. This was fun, and the boys loved thinking up pictures to make!

8. Beetle art:
The boys made these beetles after reading "The Beetle Book". They had quite alot of fun picking out which beetles they wanted to make, and made these using bits of cardboard, googly eyes and pipe cleaners (from CraftPlay, which stocks all sorts of materials for crafting). They decorated the beetles using glitter glue, markers and buttons. You can read more details for this project over in this post, along with more beetle projects!

9. Perler bead crafts:
We've been making all sorts of things using Perler beads, from giant cameras for the younger boys (using Biggie Beads), to My Little Pony and fruit magnets for a fund-raising project.

We keep getting questions about these beads, so just some info about these fused beads here:

- You place the beads on a pegboard in the pattern that you like, and iron them at a medium heat setting to fuse them together. You'll need to place a sheet of paper on top of the beads before ironing or the beads will stick to the iron. You can either use the papers provided in the bead sets, or baking paper. Don't use regular paper!

- There are a few brands of beads available, and IKEA stocks a similar version called Pyssla, and I think Daiso sells some fused bead kits as well. The most popular brands would probably be Hama and Perler. The former is available at Growing Fun stores, but we prefer the latter, as Hama beads tend to be much softer and the creations tend to break easily compared to those made using Perler beads.

- We buy our beads mainly from Amazon, as they qualify for free global shipping. We usually purchase the giant tub of mixed beads for Lil J, and the trays of sorted colours for Junior J when he works on his fund-raising project, as well as the pegboards (some of our pegboards are from IKEA). The Biggie beads and corresponding pegboards are from Amazon too. We've also ordered packets of beads of individual colours directly from EKSuccess, for the fund-raising project.

10. Build your own city:
We sometimes cut up a large cardboard box, or roll out mahjong paper and let the kids build their own city using their building blocks. They add roads and other details using markers, and have a ball of a time building their own city! (You can read more about our cardboard crafts here.)

11. Make your own aquarium:

We got the boys to paint a large piece of cardboard using blue, yellow and white poster paints, and called it our aquarium. They then filled it up with various aquatic creatures, such as fishes folded from origami paper, seahorses using Perler beads and sea urchins using pompoms!

So you have it, 11 crafty activities to try with the kids, during this hazy period. Have fun if you do try any of them!

PS: This post contains affiliate links to Amazon, but at no added cost to yourself. :)

DAISO 101: 9 products to organize your home

Daiso. It's a place the kids love to go, since they get to pick something from the store (usually they end up with stickers). It's a place that used to elicit groans from the hubby, whenever I asked to pay a visit. However, I would sometimes find him wandering the aisles with a glassy-eyed look, clutching some tools and random foodstuff, saying "it's only $2". So yes, we love the place. Many of our craft materials are purchased from Daiso, and I love how the products are of pretty decent quality. I've blogged a fair number of posts on their products, but today I'd like to share about how we keep our things organized at home using Daiso products: 

1. Tension Rods:

These come in various lengths, and can be adjusted to fit any corner or shelf. The thinner rods can take a weight of up to 2 kg, and I've read about thicker rods that can take far heavier loads. These are great as "instant shelving", and I've seen people transform their shoe storage and wardrobes with these rods. For us, the rods are handy for keeping some of our washi tapes organized (this is great especially when you want easy access, yet do not want tapes getting kidnapped by kids to be used liberally as bandages!):

The rods have been great for creating shelving where it was so badly needed. This was our "drinks cabinet", before the tension rods went in:

As you can see, we had recently purchased those dry food jars from IKEA, but everything was still stacked on each other and stuff kept toppling. All it needed was 2 tension rods, and 10 minutes later I had a shelf, and a much neater cabinet! (I used two of the frosted plastic boxes from Daiso too, to allow for easier access to breakfast spreads and various large tea packets. More on those boxes later.)

These tension rods are pretty amazing, and if you'd like more inspiration on how to use them, read this. 

2. Compartment boxes:

Daiso stocks plastic boxes with compartments, and these come in various sizes. These have been really handy for keeping small objects sorted, like crafting material (buttons and flowers), as well as kids' stuff like goggly eyes and beads. 

3. Frosted plastic boxes: 

We have a whole bunch of these! These can be stacked, and come in different heights and sizes. My only grouse for these is that you can't get covers for them. Otherwise, they are great for holding almost anything and everything, and they look a whole lot better than the average primary-coloured plastic box. I use them to hold various learning materials, I have a few in my craft trolley for holding stamps, inks and mists, we have a few in our fridge for keeping fruit, vegetables, medicines and bottles sorted. I know a friend who bought a whole pile of these to store her DVDs! 

4. Lipstick organizer:

I hardly wear make-up (I can count with my fingers the number of times I've applied lipstick!), but these lipstick organizers are great for keeping little things sorted. Like my bento food picks. This sits in a shallow drawer in the kitchen, where I can get at them easily when prepping the boys' lunchboxes. 

5. Vacuum storage bags:

We have to store a fair bit of clothes, because the kids' clothes get passed down from brother to brother. There's also the coldwear to store, as well as seasonal stuff like my maternity clothes. It's a fair bit of clothing to be kept stored, so using these bags really helps to reduce their bulkiness! I like the smaller ones that come in a pair, and they get labelled so that we can find stuff easily. 

6. Hooks

We stick many of these little hooks inside the doors of our cabinets. Those inside our bookshelf hold stuff like cables, room keys and earphones, while those in the toilet keep my hairties tidy. 

7. Wooden boxes:

These are really a steal at $2 each, and I love that Daiso changes the designs over time. We use them to store art materials, wooden blocks and chalk.

8 & 9. Baskets (and plastic shoe boxes):

The plastic shoe boxes are really great for toy storage! They keep all our building toys organized inside our Besta cupboard in the living room, and 3 boxes fit snugly on one shelf. The boys can see what is inside the boxes, and cleaning up is relatively easy! 

We use the woven baskets for storing toys such as their play food, as well as to hold thin books in the bookshelf. I find these thin books are best kept facing forward, or the kids would keep taking out the whole pile to find one title. The spines are too thin for titles to be printed, so having them in a basket means the kids can easily flip through the pile.

And there you have it: 9 versatile products, each costing only $2, that go a long way in helping to keep your home organized! If you're headed down to do some shopping, here are more posts that you might want to check out:

:: 5 great buys from Daiso

:: Another 5 things to check out in Daiso

:: Some art materials in Daiso

:: Bento tools from Daiso

:: Under the sea party packs using some stuff from Daiso

:: How to make rainbow building blocks using materials from Daiso

:: How to make a light table using the LED lamp from Daiso

:: How to make house building blocks using materials from Daiso

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This post is part of the "DAISO 101" blog train that is being hosted on this blog. Click on the button below to get the full list of Daiso posts, and happy shopping! 

Next on the blog train is Cynthia from B.C.D.E. That's Us. A FTWM with 2 boys who are 6 and 4, she blogs about her parenting journey, simple cooking "hacks" and fun activities the family enjoys - basically the forgettable and unforgettable moments as the boys grow up and the adults grow old. Do hop over to her blog tomorrow to read her guide to the $2 store!

Make: Rainbow blocks for less than $10

The Germans seem to have a love and fascination for making children's playthings out of wood. It's just one of the things they do very well: toys beautifully crafted from wood, stained or painted to perfection. I think wood is one of the loveliest materials for toys, with its natural variations in colour, the swirling woodgrain, and it's ability to be sanded down to smoothness. When we were in Germany, I was really tempted to get some of the wooden toys made by longtime toymaker Grimm's Spiel and Holz Design, but they were pretty expensive, so we ended up not getting anything (I half-regret that now though!).

I particularly liked their rainbow blocks, since they came in such a range of colors, and I was very excited to read that you could DIY your own! I decided to try making some using materials from Daiso, and they turned out pretty well, so I'm sharing how you can make your own today:

1. You'll need just two things: a set of liquid watercolors (ours were from Daiso), as well as unfinished wooden blocks (again from Daiso). 

2. Squeeze a dollop of paint (in whatever colour you'd like) onto a palette or plate with a flat base (no rounded bases please), and then add in a few drops of water. Stir to mix. Place the wooden block into the paint, and let sit for a few seconds, before turning to coat another side. Repeat, until all sides have been soaked in paint. Gently tap the block at the side of the palette to let excess paint drip off. 

3. Leave the cube on a tray to dry, and repeat steps 1 and 2 with the other cubes. The cubes should be completely dry in a day. 

Some tips to note:

:: Adding a few drops of water to the paint helps to distribute the colour evenly, since I find that the undiluted paint is too thick. However, you have to trial and error to find the paint-water balance. We discovered that the colors were not as intense as we'd like them to be if the paint is too dilute. Letting the cubes soak in the paint allows for an even colour distribution, compared to using a paint brush (but Lil J insisted on helping so I let him!). The lovely thing about using watercolors is that the woodgrain of the blocks shows up through the colors (unlike if you use acrylic paints), and the colors actually accentuate the patterns of the woodgrain. 

:: To get a whole range of colors, I started by using primary colors, and then gradually mixing them (red with yellow, yellow with blue, blue with red) to get a range of secondary colors. Along the way, I also tried mixing in white to lighten the colors. If you do follow this method, don't forget to continue to dilute the paint by adding in drops of water during the mixing process!

:: The blocks fit nicely into those little crates that they sell at Daiso too. All in all, we used up 3 packs of blocks, so our rainbow blocks set cost us $10, if you include the crate!

:: The quality of the Daiso wooden blocks seems to be dropping. We used some blocks that were purchased a year or two ago, as well as some that were recently purchased. The older blocks were made of harder wood, were sanded smooth, and didn't have splinters. Those were lovely. The newer blocks unfortunately were made of softer wood, were rougher, and many had chips or splinters and had to be sanded down. I'd say that these would be ok for older kids to play with, but keep them away from babies who are still mouthing their toys. Also, remind your kids to ensure their hands are dry when playing with these. If you'd like an alternative (especially since the blocks can go out of stock quickly in Daiso), Amazon stocks these Hygloss unfinished wooden blocks and these quality for free global shipping (Note: These are a tad smaller than the Daiso ones.).

If you do try to make your own rainbow blocks, do share your photos with us over at our FB page ok? Would love to see what you come up with!

Small Spaces: Our learning corner

Hello! Today it's our turn on the "Small Spaces" Blog train, where you get to have a glimpse into various real spaces designed for children. Since we homeschool, the boys are home for a large part of the week. This means that our home spaces have to work very hard for us! You've probably read about our reading corner, and have seen part of the boys' bedroom… and today we'll be showing you the learning corner that we've carved out of our entryway. 

The entryway was actually corridor space, which the previous owner bought over. This used to act like our "garage", and there used to be shoes, balls and umbrellas scattered all over (you can see part of the mess in the before photo!). The space was doing nothing much, aside from being a catch-all for all our outdoor stuff (like the boys' bikes and scooters), so I decided to clean it up and use it as a learning corner. Here's how it looked like before, and after the clean-up:

We have a bench in the entry that nobody sat on (because it was usually piled high with stuff!), and I cleaned it up and used it as a nature table for the kids:

The table contains natural materials that the boys' get to play with: tree blocks (which the boys' Ah Kong kindly helped to saw for us), pebbles, as well as various things that the kids pick up on their walks. I use all sorts of wooden bowls, baskets and recycled fruit containers to keep these things organized. Sometimes, we throw in various animal figures (from these Toobs) for the kids to play with. 

Part of the nature table is lined with faux grass, which we purchased from Daiso. It gives an added sensory element to their play.

Their clay salamanders. More details here. 

To the right of the bench is a larger basket where we store their balls, as well as more nature materials. The baskets are from Daiso, as well as from the market at Sungei Road (which is a gem resource for baskets!)

Above the nature table is a picture ledge from Ikea, which we use to hold all the boys' smaller natural materials, as well as their magnifying glasses. The boys love picking all sorts of fruit and leaves and what not when they go on walks, and we sort and keep the stuff that doesn't decompose easily. These are held in Rajtan spice jars (from Ikea), as well as empty baby food jars (we sometimes use baby food when we travel, and I save the jars). 

Some of their nature-related artwork is displayed above the shelf, such as Junior J's painting of beetles, Lil J's veggie stamping on canvas (the canvas is from Daiso), and the butterflies that they've made. I also put up some vintage educational postcards on plant parts (from here). 

There was space to the right of the nature table, which I used to display the boys' aquariums: cardboard pieces painted to look like the sea, containing various sea creatures which they've made. We add new creatures to their aquariums occasionally. The toddler loves looking at these!

Top aquarium by Junior J, bottom aquarium by Lil J. Junior J's one even has a key!

Below the aquariums is an old Ikea frame that I've repurposed to allow us to display pictures. I'm planning to use this to introduce artists and their paintings to the kids, but for now they will just hold postcards from various parts of the world. Making this was easy: I just cut twine and pasted it to the back of the base of the frame using washi tape. The postcards are held up by wooden pegs from Daiso. 

We managed to squeeze in our sensory bin below that display. This is a Torkis clothes basket from Ikea, and by far the best container I've found for sensory play. It's tall enough to reduce spillage, and large enough to give all 3 enough space to play. I've found most other trays too shallow or small, or much too large. Best of all, it costs less than $8!

Right now the bin is empty, save for some tools that were from the kit from My Messy Box. 

The wall opposite to the nature table was empty, so I put up an adhesive blackboard strip (from Joli Petite). We have a blackboard wall in the house, but the boys mainly get to doodle on this one instead, as it is "outside" the house. This way, the dust gets more or less contained.

The boys use both regular chalk, as well as sidewalk chalk. I love the colors of the sidewalk chalk, as well as how these are nice and thick (which means they do not break easily!). This mini crate from Daiso is perfect for holding the chalk. 

On the side opposite to the main door is our mini garden, which sits atop of our shoe cabinet. The boys help to water the plants, but this is another area I would like to tidy and do up! Above the garden is our enamel tray display, which greets us when we enter the house (you can read more about this display here). 

All in all, this learning space is working well for us. Since this is "outside", the mess is more or less contained, which means I don't need to fret so much about dust (from the chalkboard) and sand (from the sensory bin). Also, the boys are trained to leave any natural materials at the nature table and not bring them indoors, so we are not so worried about soil and bugs getting into the house. There are just two drawbacks though. While this area gets plenty of sunlight, it also means it can get pretty hot, and we are thinking of installing a fan here. That aside, since this is just inside the main door, the boys sometimes get so distracted playing here that we can't get them to leave the house when we are headed out! 

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This post is part of the "Small Spaces" series that is hosted by this blog. Please click the button below to take a look at more children's spaces!

Next on the blog is Danessa Foo from PrayerFull Mum. Danessa is enjoying the new season in her life as a Stay-at-Home Mum, now that they are back in their homeland Singapore after being overseas for 2 years. Head over to her blog tomorrow, to find out how Danessa dealt with smaller spaces in her new "old" house after enjoying spacious living in America.