Halloween Craft – Spooky Slime

**This was written for our local Macaroni Kid newsletter! I figured I would share on my blog as well! Haven't heard of Macaroni Kid? Check to see if your local area has one HERE **

I don’t know about your home, but the slime craze hit my house hard over the past year. We have all sorts of different types, textures, and colors of slime. With Halloween right around the corner, I started thinking that we needed some spooky slime! I wanted something bright and Halloween themed. I headed to my local craft store and Target, and found everything I needed for some frightening new slime! I got all my ingredients for under $10 and if you have some of the items at home (ie. baking soda and contact solution) it could be even cheaper to make. This recipe makes a huge batch with plenty to share, plus it was an easy project to do with my two daughters.

So here is what you need to make spooky slime:

• 1 cup of clear school glue (2- 5oz bottles)
• 1 cup of water
• 1 teaspoon of baking soda
• Bottle of Contact Solution
• Lime green glitter (or color of your choice)
• Halloween Confetti
• Mixing bowl, measuring cups/ spoons, and a spatula to stir
• A jar or container to store the finished product

Here’s how we make it:

Step 1: Measure out 1 cup of clear glue and pour it into a mixing bowl.

Step 2: Measure out 1 cup of water and pour in with the glue in the mixing bowl

Step 3: Mix until both the glue and the water are combined

Step 4: Add the glitter to the mixture. I used approximately ½ cup of fine lime green glitter. Stir until fully mixed.

Step 5: Add 1 teaspoon of baking soda to the mixture. Continue to mix until completely dissolved.

Step 6: Add contact solution. I started out with 2 tablespoons and mixed. You can feel it starting to get stiffer. Keep mixing and add contact solution as needed until the mixture is no longer sticking to the bowl.

Step 7: Work in a few handfuls of confetti.

Step 8: Enjoy playing with your new spooky slime! Store it in a container or small mason jar when you finish playing with it! If it is sticking to your hands or any surfaces add more contact solution.

Lessons Learned: I always like to reflect on ways that I could do a project better. I was pretty impressed with how this came out. I do want to note that while getting your slime to the perfect consistency, it may get on your clothes if you are not careful. Somehow, I was the only one who managed to get it on both my jeans and shirt. The good news is that it came out in the washing machine with no problem or pretreat! Also, the contact solution will be your best friend when making the slime just the right consistency, but remember to add small amounts at a time. It’s always better to have to add more, then to have added too much!

Fall Craft - Yarn Pumpkins

**This was written for our local Macaroni Kid newsletter! I figured I would share on my blog as well! Haven't heard of Macaroni Kid? Check to see if your local area has one HERE **

I always welcome the fall season with open arms. Hello to the cooler days, changing leaves, and pumpkin spice everything! This season always gives me the warm fuzzy feeling as everyone comes together for apple festivals, pumpkin patches, and harvest fun! It also opens the door to crafting and decorating galore! I consider myself a pretty crafty person and enjoy making things to spruce up the house! When it was finally time to put my craftiness to work and create a fall craft with the kids, I went straight to Pinterest for ideas. When I look for crafts, I look for cheap, cute, and quick. As a mom, you know you don’t have much time to devote to crafting and if the kids are helping, you have even less time to try to keep them occupied. When I saw these cute little yarn pumpkins, I decided that they were a must try and I headed off to my local craft store. I was able to pick up a huge thing of orange yarn and some pipe cleaners for less than $5!

Here’s what you will need:

• ·         Orange yarn
• ·         Scissors
• ·         Green pipe cleaner

Here’s how to do it:

• Start by wrapping the yarn around your four fingers. I tucked the starting end to keep it nice and tight.

• ·         Firmly (but not too tight or too loose) wrap the yarn neatly around your fingers about 120 times. The kids counted out loud with me (look at that, I added basic math skills into my craft! Mom win!)

• ·         Once you are done wrapping, cut the yarn from the roll. Now cut a 10-inch piece of yarn.

• ·       With the yarn still wrapped around your fingers, slide the 10-inch piece of yarn in between your two fingers.

• ·       Pull the 10-inch piece tightly around the wrapped yarn and carefully slide the yarn off your fingers and pull tightly and tie it off. You now should see your pumpkin shape. Fluff your pumpkin out to make it look neat and rounded.

• ·      Cut a 2-inch piece of green pipe cleaner and tie it on the pumpkin with the yarn that is holding your pumpkin into shape. Now fold in half and twist the pipe cleaner together to create a stem.

• ·         Cut off any leftover yarn from your pumpkin.

There you have it, a yarn pumpkin ready to use to decorate! You can use your children’s hands to make different size pumpkins. You can also take some twine or string and create a pumpkin garland by tying the pumpkins into place before cutting the excess yarn from the pumpkin in the last step or you could just use them to decorate around the house or create a cute center piece for a table!

Lessons learned:

With any craft that I do, I like to reflect on any lessons that I learned along the way. I learned two very important ones with this project. First, do not wrap the yarn too tight around your fingers, your fingers will begin to turn purple and it makes the yarn hard to slide off. Second lesson learned was to wrap neatly. The first pumpkin I made I just wrapped quickly crossing all over the place and it made for a very messy looking pumpkin and me needing to redo it!