A Star to Behold

Yesterday we decided to make some stars of our own to decorate our home, and to help the Magi find their way to Jesus.

 This technique is called corn syrup painting- it produces a standard picture, but the paint looks glossy when dry.

You will need: 
Paper
Black crayon
Corn syrup
Food coloring
Paint brushes

 The recipe is simple: add a little corn syrup to several drops of food coloring to a small dish. More food coloring makes a darker color, less makes lighter. You can do a lot of neat things by swirling colors together as well since they talk a while to combine completely. Regular paint brushes work well for this project, but you may need to soak them in some water before they come completely clean again.

 Take a black crayon and draw your picture on paper. Glossy paper looks extra neat, but regular paper works well too. Remember to make your drawings "coloring book style," because you'll be painting inside the lines.

Then, use the corn syrup paint to color your drawing in! Use a lot of paint for the best effect.

In honor of Epiphany, we drew a bright star in the night sky, with wise men at the bottom. Be creative- yours may be different.

 Some of us didn't get the memo about Christmas being over :), so a few Christmas trees were done as well. I included this picture so that you can see the gloss of the paint. So fun!

This is my two-year old's finished product. Use your imagination here, folks: yellow is the star, dark blue is the night sky, and red in the corner are the Magi.

Leave them to dry for a long, long, time. Where we used the most paint it took a solid 24 hours, so put your masterpieces somewhere they won't be bothered for a day or so.

Making Christmas Ornaments

While we were working on our Advent Action card about fixing the broken ornaments on our tree, we discovered that many of them were beyond repair. Oh no! I set out to find some ornament tutorials to give us ideas to make our own. Here are a few of our favorites:

I loved this idea from Thrifty Mama- making your own ornaments out of fabric scraps! Of course, I love any idea which promotes re-purposing items we already have around the house, but I liked that this was an easy one for little hands and it can be used year after year. And did I mention that it's so pretty?

Go here for the full instructions.



 
Here's another fun one from Diamond In The Stuff...




















...and another take on that from Flea Market Style.




















If you don't like those, try this link to Everything Etsy, which has links to 100 different ornament tutorials. There's no excuse to have broken ornaments on the tree now!

Angel Craft

This one is for the younger set- preschool and kindergartners who like getting messy will appreciate this task!

For complete project directions go here.

Nativity Silhouette Art Project

This one is for older kids, or a younger child with a lot of grown up help. These are just so beautiful!

For complete project directions, go here.