We're making a nice early start to our Halloween planning this year. New house, we've got some cool ideas. First job we ticked off - a spooky monster eye for the front door. So super easy to make, perfect if you have a round glass panel like us but it will still work on other style doors too.

All you need is paper and glue. A big sheet of white paper, some black and a colour. We went with green, but you could do red or yellow etc.  Just cut a big circle of white paper to a size big enough to cover your round window or fit the width of your front door. Next circle a bit smaller is your colour, smaller again for the black and a little circle of white to look light the light bouncing off. SO EASY! Glue together with some stick glue and for longevity have it laminated!

I love the colours, shapes and sparkle of a geode. So we thought we'd try making our own with whatever art supplies we felt like - watercolours, pens (markers) and a bit of bling!

How to make geode art:
* You'll need a large piece of thickish paper to start Any sort of watercolour or heavier drawing paper will do. 
* Get some scraps of paper in colours that work well together. 
(This can be a good opportunity to talk to kids about the colour wheel, complementary and harmonious colours if you like - colours on opposite sides of the wheel are called a complementary. Colours adjacent to each other are harmonious. A harmonious colour scheme works really well for this project.)
​* Rip the scraps of paper into a few different sized circle/oval shapes. These will form the centre of the geode so you want them to be increasingly bigger. Three or four pieces is enough. 
* Stick your ripped paper onto the large piece of paper right in the middle.
* Using pens draw around the outline of the largest piece of ripped paper and repeat as much as you like.
* You can add watercolour paint the same way (don't be afraid to wet the pen lines that adds to the effect) 
* We added glitter paint, some sparkling sequins and paint dabs to finish!

The school holidays certainly seem to have come round quick this time. Well I guess in Queensland they kind of did, we had a later start to term here due to covid concerns = a shorter term. Here are a few of our favourite ideas to keep the kids busy these school holidays. 

We've got a stack of FREE DOWNLOADS including the very popular emu template for kids to colour in. The blog also has some other fun ideas like this half face portrait idea, just search the Kids art and craft category. There's also our cut and sew fabric panels for kids to make their own cute animals cushions!

Create your own crazy colourful emu with our cute free printable template of the emu eyes, beak and a fine guide for the neck. Prints onto standard A4 or it's fine to blow up a little bigger to A3 like we did here. Available from the free downloads section.

Just in time for Christmas we've got a new fun, festive and educational free download. Kids give the polar bear an ugly sweater by adding in lines of repeating patterns. You can draw them, stick on sequins, or here we even used pom poms! A cute project to help with pattern recognition. Print onto A4 or letter sized paper, or easily blows up to larger sizes if you prefer. 
Download here.

Are we alone? Be inspired by an other-worldly trend we're seeing more of lately - flying saucers.
Here are some other alien ideas we love - a UFO made of a paper plate, half of an acrylic ball and a pom pom. A fun kids activity great for party decorations too. Delicious looking UFO cupcakes by Donna Hay. The recipe is no longer available but you can use this very similar step by step on Sweetest Kitchen.

With Halloween just around the corner I had to share this great idea for pumpkin decorating! If you're familiar with Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama's work you'll probably know about her pumpkin sculptures, but I just loved this idea from handmadecharlotte as it combined that with her instillation work - the obliteration room. Paint a pumpkin white, cover it with colourful sticker dots! Love it.

With Easter just around the corner I thought I'd design another FREE printable, this time an Easter bunny treat cone for collecting all those little eggs in.

Instructions:
1. Visit the free download section of the shop and print out the PDF template
2. Cut around the outside of the template (parents may want to do this for smaller children especially round the tricky ears)
3. Fold the tab over then glue or tape it into place
4. Go hunting for yummy treats

After a couple of weeks working on some new bathroom designs and octopus illustrations I decided to put together this quick kids craft project. It’s the perfect way to practice basic scissor skills with some simple straight lines to cut along.

Instructions:

1. Visit the free download section of the shop and print out the PDF template
2. Cut around the outside of the template (parents may want to do this for smaller children) then cut along the dashed lines to create the legs
3. Glue or tape the tab into place
4. Curl the legs out so you octopus can sit down
You might even want to decorate him a little more and add googly eyes