Crystal Snowmen

Crystal Snowmen | Borax Christmas Ornament Craft

I love how these crystal snowmen catch the light of the low winter sun.

These snowmen are our version of the traditional borax Christmas ornaments.  I used white pipe cleaners (chenille sticks) to represent the snowmen:  one per ornament/sun catcher.

Crystal Snowmen

The above photo shows how we made them.  They were pretty easy for my 3-year-old to help with.

We took one stick and made it into a circle, twisting the ends around each other to seal the shape.  Then we twisted it a little over a third of the way up to create the bottom circle of the snowman, and again to create the torso and head.

Crystal Snowmen

I tied some thread to the top of the snowmen and wrapped that thread around the handle of a spoon that fit over a wide, 1 liter measuring cup.  You can do just one ornament in a smaller glass, but I wanted to do two at a time.

Make sure you have a enough room to hang the snowmen, then take them out of the glass.  Fill the glass with water and boil it in the microwave, or add boiling water from another source.  Mix in the borax and stir gently, then put the snowmen back in.  Let it sit overnight.  Done!

You’ll need:

pipe cleaners (chenille sticks)
thread
4 cups boiling water
1/2 cup borax

After sitting overnight, dump out the water.  If the crystals that formed on the snowmen attached to crystals on the bottom of the glass, simply chip them gently away with a fork.  Then, unravel the thread from the spoon and tie a loop to attach to suction cups for a window or a hook for a tree ornament.

What kind of borax ornaments have you made?

And don’t forget to check out these other Christmas crafts:

DIY Lifesize Cardboard Gingerbread House

Felt Fashion Christmas Tree

Easy Christmas Craft: Paper Cone Christmas Trees

Easy Christmas Craft: Toilet Paper Roll Ornament Painting

Roaming Rosie Signature

DIY Halloween Felt Board

DIY Halloween Felt Board

During one of my recent random wanderings of Michaels, I was passing the racks of felt and thought:  ooh – Halloween felt board!

Why not?

So, I picked up a few sheets of regular felt in orange (for pumpkins), white (for ghosts), and purple (for bats), and also a sheet of “stiffened felt” in black for the background (a night sky).

DIY Halloween Felt Board

I had a few scraps of felt left over from previous projects, so I grabbed the brown and yellow remnants, and cut a spooky tree and full moon from them.

All of the shapes, including the ones listed above, were all cut out by hand.

I considered drawing faces on the ghosts and pumpkins, or cutting out small pieces of felt to let the kids make their own jack o’ lanterns, but I decided I just didn’t want to find tiny, tiny pieces of black felt faces all over the house for the next month.

So:  no faces.  But I like the clean lines, so I’m happy with the decision.

DIY Halloween Felt Board

Felt sticks to felt, so you don’t need any glue or velcro or anything like that, but I do have to warn you:  the felt doesn’t stick firmly to the stiffened felt, so we played with this on the floor, instead of hanging it on the wall or fridge.

Still a lot of fun.  :)

DIY Halloween Felt Board

What kinds of felt boards have you used?

Check out my Halloween crafts from last year, and our new Chalkboard Pumpkins!

Chalkboard Pumpkins: Halloween Crafts

This October, I decided to incorporate my daughters’ love of chalk into our Halloween activities.

The result?

Chalkboard pumpkins!

chalkboard pumpkins halloween and thanksgiving crafts for kids

These were so easy.  I started with a can of my trusty chalkboard spray paint, and picked up 3 foam “carve-able” pumpkins from the Dollar Tree.

Since the pumpkins were a bit porous, I did a few more coats than I normally would.  I placed them on some old cardboard, sprayed the bottoms first, then turned them over and sprayed the top.

Did 5 coats over the top half-ish.  Let the paint dry between coats, of course.  Then took them, and a box of chalk, outside.  Did some crafting in the fresh fall air.

chalkboard pumpkins halloween and thanksgiving crafts for kids

The girls spent a lot of time decorating their pumpkins.  Spent some time wiping off the designs with a damp paper towel, and then drawing all over them again.

The pumpkins are decorating our house now.  And they’ll be re-decorated themselves a few times before Halloween even gets here.  But, because they’re pumpkins, we’ll probably leave them out for Thanksgiving, too.

One thing important to mention, is that we did initially play with these outside, but they’re really indoor decorations because of the material the pumpkins are made from.  But you could always use something different if you want to display them outdoors.

chalkboard pumpkins halloween and thanksgiving crafts for kids

chalkboard pumpkins halloween and thanksgiving crafts for kids

And just for informational purposes, here is a photo of the half-finished pumpkins, to give you an idea of what they looked like while they were being painted:

chalkboard pumpkins halloween and thanksgiving crafts for kids

Have fun – and let me know if you try it!  :)

Oh, and here are our Halloween crafts from last year!

Plus, read about the Digital Wasabi Tape I used in this post.

This project was featured at:

Sweet Bella Roos