Kiddie Crafts - V is for Valentines and VOLCANOES!

Zaxxon and I spent several days before Valentine's day making cards for our family.

I discovered, upon heading downstairs to gather supplies, that I was out of green construction paper, so I wound up using my cardstock for these.  That made for more expensive cards, but on the other hand, I've done precious little scrapbooking since Zaxxon's birth, so the paper was just sitting around anyway.  (He was having a pajama day, in case you couldn't tell.)

The Valentines were heart-shaped frogs.  I got the idea from the February issue of Parents magazine, and thought they would make a fun activity.

He managed to cut several eyes out by himself, and I tried to put one of "his" eyes on each card.

The frogs got increasingly Picassoesque as we went along--some have legs for tongues and tongues for legs, others have one eye facing forward and one backwards, or the eyes are in odd places.  That's part of the fun of crafting with children!

I took advantage of Valentine's Day to formally introduce the letter "V" to Zaxxon.  Here he's coloring the "V" words.

We had only a few minutes on this day, and my intention had been for him to quickly scribble on the pictures as usual, and then we would paste them together another day.  Well, Zaxxon surprised me by attempting to actually color the pictures this day, instead of just scribbling on the whole page and calling it done like he usually does.  He even wanted different colors for each picture.  So how was I supposed to say "no" to that?  Suffice it to say, naptime got delayed.

Pasting the "V" pictures to the "V" page

Zaxxon helped me make chocolate dipped strawberries on Valentine's day itself

It's very hard to keep one's fingers out of the chocolate.  He did a great job

Of course, we had to continue "V" into Volcano!

Here we're making salt dough

Shaping the volcano.

Painting the volcano

Erupting the volcano!  In my memory, all I ever did to erupt a volcano at home was mix baking soda and colored vinegar.  However, when looking up salt dough recipes online, nearly all resources said to place a large bottle in the middle--20oz up to 2 litre--and then fill it most of the way with warm water and dish soap first.  Then they said to add the baking soda to the water mixture, and then add the vinegar last. 

Supposedly, the released carbon dioxide would make the dish soap fizz up, creating a better eruption.  We attempted this, however I was not impressed.  I don't think the eruption was at all superior, and the narrow-necked water bottle inside just made it harder for a little kid to get everything in.  And made things get clogged inside.  Don't get me wrong, Zaxxon LOVED this activity and wanted to do it daily.  We had to show both sets of grandparents how it was done, and he cried when I said I would be throwing it away soon.  Still, when we make future volcanoes I will simply use a baby food jar for the reservoir and stick to just baking soda and vinegar.