Special thanks to Stacy for hosting CT last week while we were off playing on the beach!

Now for this week…

Come on! You didn’t really expect to see anything did you?! I’m barely unpacked and have been plunged back into reality with art classes, swim lessons, and real world chores again. So I haven’t really had a spare moment to craft anything, although I do have some projects that are in desperate need of attention. Hopefully I’ll get to those this week.

The great Summer School Project of ’09 was on hiatus last week as well. We did get some little jellyfish made before we left and have been populating the ocean with some other creatures.

This week we are moving on to bugs and butterflies with a field trip to the Natural History Museum where they have a butterfly pavillion – pretty excited about that!

Does anyone have some real crafty goodness to share today?

Are you ready for some craaaafts? (That doesn’t quite work with one syllable words, does it?)

Well, we have some stuff to show you today. Let me tell you, there hasn’t been any slacking around here this week.

Let me also tell you how excited I am that more of my faithful readers are joining in our crafting extravaganzas. It is inspiring and I’m stealing finding good ideas left and right! Last week Blueberry and the Bean posted a cool paper craft idea that I promptly recognized as perfect for all of the crazy scrapbook paper scraps I have lying around. So we made flowers for all of the teachers. Addie’s were delivered last week, Em’s are getting delivered on Thursday.

I also got the awesome idea from Hip Momma for the rest of the teacher gifts. I picked up some of these frames and we doodled on the first page (only!) and put in a sunflower photo.

So thanks, Ladies for the timely help!

After the teacher gifts, I moved onto the stack of birthday cards that I had to make. We have so many birthday peeps coming up.

and some more…

They are kinda dark pics, but you get the idea. And the best thing about all of the cards (besides the fact that they are cheap to make)? I used only scraps from my scrap stash! Recycling and crafty all-in-one, gotta love it.

One of the birthdays we have coming up is my sweet niece, Madey who will be turning 6! I was planning on making her a little summer sundress, so I took the munchkins to the fabric store to help me pick out a fun fabric.

Yeah. Apparently I temporarily forgot that my two diva-liscious girls LOVE the fabric store. We walked out with not only a dress for Madey, but one for Emma, one for Addie, and even enough for a wee dress for Bear. I have a hard enough time controlling my own fabric urges, it is downright impossible times three.

Next time, they must stay home.

So while we were waiting for Madey’s measurements, I put together Em’s… (The skirt is tiny little red and black ladybugs…of course.)

And Addie’s with a matching one for Bear…all fabric and ribbon picked out by the girls, remember. Not what I would have picked, but they turned out okay.

Totally simple little dresses, that anyone can make. And Addie’s fabric was on the clearance rack (it is all shirred on the top already even!) So we got the fabric for $2.96! Add in the ribbon and I made her dress (and Bear’s!) for less than $5. They may be impossibly stylish, but at least they can also find good deals!

We also started the Chore and Behavior chart today (well, yesterday) complete with tickets and prizes!

And I made these little ticket holders (more recycles! Mocha tins and scrap paper!)…

They each earned nine tickets today. I know it is new…but wow! It really did work.

Well, almost. Notice Emma did not get a stamp for No Whining, and Addie did not get one for Listening to Mommy. But the determination to get it right tomorrow is there. They are pumped. We’ll see what happens in the next few months. Yeah, we’ll see.

And our Summer School Project ‘O9 kicks off next Monday! I have been making flash cards for our first installment (ocean creatures) and Addie and I are going to create our ocean tomorrow morning. I must say that I have been having so much fun drawing the creatures and scouring the ‘net for crafts and fun activities. I hope the girls have even half as much fun and then I know it will be totally worth it. Mmm…and maybe learn a thing or two, as well. Here are a few of my favorites…

And just a little fyi – it is VERY difficult to come up with recognizable creatures for every letter of the alphabet. But I managed to do it with the ocean creatures. I’m working on Bugs and Butterflies now…and it might be impossible. We may have to take a different tact. But let me know if you need help or want to see them – or just want the flashcards, I’m happy to share.

And hit me with what you’ve got this week. Keep me on a roll throughout the summer with some crafty goodness!

Oops…a little late (later) than usual today. But where did Monday go?? My sister was here this weekend, a kind of impromptu, last minute, we-just-realized-that-a-free-ticket-was-going-to-expire, sort of trip. She was only here for 3 days, and we didn’t do much but just hang out, but now I feel mopey again. The short little visits are almost worse, I think. You just get a taste of the fun, and then they are gone again. It was the same way when my parents were here last month – long enough to see them and realize how much you miss them when they are not there, and then you are back to missing them again. (Plus poor Dad was so sick, we still have a full agenda of things to take them to do! Next time…)

Anyhow, there is my excuse. Not too much crafting. I actually did do 2 birthday cards for friends last week and forgot to take photos of them before I sent them off. One of them is for someone’s birthday tomorrow…so make sure to stop and give her some love on Wednesday.

I did remember to take a pic of the card Addie and I did for Hope – her little friend who had a crazy fun birthday party over the weekend. But I didn’t take a pic of the inside where she signed her own name, with no help from me! And it is legible! It was a very proud moment for her.

Ugh. The colors are so, so off in that. But I don’t have time to go back and fix it. You get the idea. I have a list on my desk of cards I need to make in the next 2 weeks before vacation. 17 cards! Yikes. I better get on that.

But on to my new obsession! Which is indeed crafty, but requires a little bit of planning on my part. We were at a friend’s last week and she has a whole summer curriculum planned out for her kids, with all kinds of experiments, crafts, learning, field trips, etc. It completely inspired me and got me so jacked up to do a similar (a little more subdued, perhaps) program for the girls. At first I was trying to get rid of the stuff we have to do this summer so we could just chill, but I already got an “I’m bored, Mama!” from Emma and school isn’t even out! So I think we need a little structure and continued learning in our long summer days.

Last night I sat down with my trusty markers and posterboard and mapped out our Summer School activities. Emma is beside herself with excitement. She keeps asking me – where we are going, what we are going to learn, who is coming on the field trips, do we get homework? It just goes on and on…(She is such a first-born girl like her Mama! Homework? YES!!)

Addie is a little bit more, well, she is cautiously optimistic that it will be fun, but not on the same bandwagon as Em.
Let’s just put it that way.

I set it up so each week we’d have a topic and then I can set up field trips around our “subject.” We are doing ocean animals (field trip to Aquarium and actually 2 weeks of this one, since we are going to do stuff in Hawaii, too!), bugs and butterflies (field trip to the Nat. History Museum’s Butterfly Pavillion), botany – flowers and trees (field trip to Huntington Gardens), planets and stars (field trip to Griffith Observatory), dinosaurs (field trip to Nat. History Museum again – dino exhibits), and then just animals – differences between mammals/reptiles/birds (field trip to the Zoo). And, the girls really want to try camping. So we’ll take a week to prepare for that and do a little overnight tent camping trip mid-July.

That should keep us busy, right? I’m using these books for the academic stuff and I’ll just tie our crafts into whatever subjects we are studying that week. I’m really excited about this. So I feel like my scrapbooking and sewing will probably take a back seat for the summer (again!) while I do fun little plans for summer school stuff – but we should definitely have some Crafty Tuesdays in all of this.

Any other ideas or websites you have to help with the Great Summer School Project of ’09? Have anything to share today??