Story Inspired Craft Kit: The Very Hungry Caterpillar

It's Little E's 4th birthday tomorrow. We have decided to bring cupcakes to her preschool and celebrate with her teachers and friends.

Little E helped me bake 24 strawberry cupcakes last night. On the other hand, I have been brainstorming about what to pack as party favors for her classmates. When Big E or Little E went to a friend's birthday party, we always got a goodie bag filled with small toys and candies. I would like to do something different this time!

I prepared a paper craft kit inspired by Eric Carle's storybook "The Very Hungry Caterpillar". Little E's friends can simply look at the complete project picture and put it together with or without parents's help.

I cut out the parts needed to make the very hungry caterpillar using origami paper. And I drew all the fruit eaten by the caterpillar on another piece of white paper.

Little E's friends can glue all the parts together to make the caterpillar. Then color/cut/glue the different fruit on the appropriate blank line according to the story. Here is the complete look of the project!

Little E is definitely excited to have this craft kit as her party favor for friends. I hope the kids will have a good time making this project at home, too!

Paper Dress - Maui Fish Paper Dress

Spring break was in late April this year. We had booked a vacation to visit Maui for 5 nights long ago!

It turned out to be a wonderful trip full of blue sky, clear water, activities, and yummy seafood. Big E and Daddy went snorkeling and saw schools of tropical fish. We also visited Maui Ocean Center (The Hawaii Aquarium) and saw a variety of fish that are local in Maui.

Little E and I couldn't stop talking about the colorful fish we saw so we decided to make a paper dress out of it!

I cut out a dress pattern using blue tissue paper and a piece of drawing poster paper. I also prepared some origami paper and a fish pattern found online.

 Little E colored the fish fins and cut out strips of paper to make the fish scales.

Look at the long and beautiful red fish tail!

On another day, we used the colorful polka dots paper to make sea stars and seaweeds in the water. 

Little E had a fun time cutting out circles and glued them on one by one.

Here is what the dress looks like.

It's our 10th paper dress made together - The Maui Fish!

We can't wait to visit Hawaii again in the near future!

Paper Dress: Easter Egg Paper Dress

Easter is just around the corner and all kinds of egg drawing, egg painting and egg hunting activities are ongoing at schools now.

I found some Easter egg coloring pattern online. Little E and I had fun coloring eggs on paper!

 We cut them out and made some bunny ears for the dress.

Then we glued the eggs and flowers on the dress together.

Look how colorful and cheery it is!

Here it is our 9th paper dress - The Easter Egg!

Happy Easter, everyone!

Storybook: The SqueezeNecker

Last Saturday, the kids wanted to have a piece of chocolate in the afternoon. As Daddy was opening the pantry, Big E yelled excitedly "I want, the, the, hmm, the SqueezeNecker!"

Knowing what he was really asking for, I couldn't stop laughing and told him it's called "Snickers". After Big E opened his mini Snickers, it was indeed a bit squeezed and crushed!

Two days later, Big E came up with his fifth storybook - The SqueeseNecker.

Paper Dress: The Doughnut Ballerina

I'm not trying to advertise for any companies.

But once in a while, we do get the craving for these lovely, soft and sweet rings. They are so warm and devilishly yummy when they are just right out of the fryer.

My favorite is the simple glazed doughnut. Big E and Little E love the ones with chocolate frosting plus multicolored sprinkles.

Why not having fun with doughnuts in another way?! I drew 10 doughnuts on the paper and we cut them out. Little E had a great time coloring them and making different designs!

Then I cut out the skirt using thin poster paper. Cut one layer of pink tissue paper into 5 equal strips. Little E squeezed the white glue on the skirt in a line.I glued 4 wrinkled tissue paper strips on to make ruffles.

Little E glued 3 doughnuts on the 5th tissue paper strip to make a belt.

After gluing the rest of the doughnuts on, here is our 8th paper dress: The Doughnut Ballerina! 

(Little E insisted on the name.)