Everyday Materials

Baby Food Candle Jars

Despite putting my best foot forward toward making my own baby food, I’ve still succumbed to buying jars of smashed peas and pureed peaches for handy food on-the-go. While all of our jars get recycled, it’s hard to ignore the quantity of glass or the art-making potential in these adorable little vessels. I allowed about [...]

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Face Collage for Scribblers

When I was an art teacher, the youngest age group I worked with was Kindergarten so I rarely had the chance to witness a child’s transition from scribbling to representational drawing. My three year old daughter is at the precipice of representational drawing and it’s an exciting place to be, but she can get frustrated [...]

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Mud Pie Kitchen: Beta Version

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This may not look like much, but we’ve been testing our mud pie kitchen and getting a fresh perspective on what works. It used to reside in another part of our yard, and I thought that moving it might make it more accesible. And it did!! I fashioned the stove/sink from two wooden crates I [...]

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Hanging Fabric Collage

While my daughter could spend all day at the park, she’s not so interested in hanging out in our garden these days. I’m wrapping my head around the dilemma of spending too much time inside, and have a few theories and solutions brewing, one of which is to take our art projects outside! Materials Paper [...]

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Flubber Gak Slime Exploration

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This SLIME recipe has been on my to-do list ever since reading about Amy’s The Great Slime-Off on Child Central Station. Amy shares two different recipes: the first calls for liquid starch and the second calls for Borax. I looked all over town for liquid starch and it was nowhere to be found. Is it prohibited [...]

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Bubble Print Lunch Bag

We made prints from some bubble wrap I rescued from a recent package. It was one of those projects that came together quickly — I can’t remember why exactly, but I didn’t have my camera ready. The good news is that I collected lots of good material on this topic…scroll to the bottom for tutorials [...]

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Toilet Paper Roll Marble Run

My daughter is obsessed with marble runs, and this may be the fourth one we’ve built in one week! Here’s another one we made last week with a cardboard box. For this toilet paper roll marble run, we started by wrapping the rolls with colored masking tape.This alone took a good part of a morning! [...]

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Cardboard Box Challenge

TinkerLab is one today! To help me celebrate a year of exploration, tinkering, creativity, and experimentation, I’ve invited some of my favorite arts and education bloggers to join me in today’s Cardboard Box Challenge as a gift to each of YOU. My blogging journey was originally inspired by the fabulous Jean of The Artful Parent [...]

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Cardboard Box Splat Printing

Did you hear the buzz? TinkerLab turns ONE tomorrow! To celebrate my one-year blogiversary (silly me –can you believe I thought I made this word up?!), I invited about twenty of my favorite bloggers to join me in a cardboard box challenge — right here — tomorrow! And wouldn’t you know that they said “yes!” [...]

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