Thursday, May 17, 2012

Flat Cardboard Houses





Hello friends! Thank you for all your comments and email on that last post about the missing Tshirt. I so appreciate them! It was maddening that it happened, and sure, I've lost domestic mail every now and then. But today I was mostly frustrated because the postal service is one of the few things that keeps me connected to family back in Singapore. I mean, that's how I can still dependably celebrate things like birthdays and anniversaries and Christmas with actual gifts and cards and not just email or texts or tweets. And then this. Grrr. So imagining a dramatic crime scene in which people nicked stuff out of packages was a nice way to deny the perfectly rational third possibility: the package simply broke open and stuff fell out. I'll have to have Mum show me the package on skype to know for sure. If that's what happened, then it's actually a miracle that the quilt made it to Singapore. So for that, I am thankful. I can always - even with much grumbling - sew Mum another Tshirt, but I could never replace the quilt that was a seven-year-old's first patchwork project on her new sewing machine. How's that for reframing?

I'm done with the moroseness, though. It could've been worse. Let's move on! And what better way than with cardboard? (Rhetorical - don't answer. There is no better way.)

So today I needed a simple, independent craft for the younger girls so I could work on my own thing. Jenna has been asking for daily crafts, and after a while, even pinterest ideas will run out. I drew these houses on cardboard last night for the girls to color this morning. I could have drawn them on paper but there's something about coloring a rigid object that seems to appeal to kids. I dunno.

So after the coloring, the girls could, if they wanted, stick faces in the windows. We drew faces on round stickers and cut out our own faces from old family photos. And by "old", I mean "those Christmas photos from 3 years ago that we printed too many copies of".

Jenna, astute as always, asked, "What do we do with them when they're done?"
I said, feebly, "You can put them up for display."
And Jenna remarked, "Then that's not really a craft. That's just coloring."
Grrrrrrr. This is what happens when I spoil them with 3D cardboard moving stuff and electronics.

Anyway, here's what they made of this Not-Really-A-Craft:

We left the fifth house for Emily to color, but she wanted to build marshmallow and toothpick structures.

And then Kate got into those, too, and made me a squid. 

I've seen many marshmallow(or pea)-toothpick structures, but I've never seen a squid. She just about made my day.


7 comments:

  1. I love the squid!

    I have a whole bunch of gorgeous cardboard I brought back from IKEA last weekend. Need to figure out what to make with it...

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  2. goodness, your drawings are cute! I thought about you for a minute or two as I spent 5.5 hours practicing on an industrial sewing machine. I LOVE the walking foot, but the knee-foot lifter is not calibrated to my knee!

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  3. Tell Jenna they could be stage sets. She could use her peg dolls as actresses.

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  4. I LOVE your cardboard projects....they are the best!!!

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  5. I love the camper!! I love your cute drawings.

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  6. Cutest squid I've ever seen!! :)

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  7. These are way cool. You could stick paper lips to the back of them to stand them up and make a town to drive toy cars around in. That's what I think we'll be doing. We're (read I'm) a bit crazy for cardboard at ours so I think this is definitely going to get a run after breakfast. Thanks

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