Homemade Soap: a Tutorial from a Very Creative Person

We are starting a new Project in our blog:

Very Creative Person.
Interview and tutorials with creative people

And today we are inviting you to meet Nadezhda, a mother of two sons, Silvestr (3,5) and Makar (2). Actually, you already know Nadezhda as some time ago she told us how to make design paper in home environment. And today she'll tell us how to make beautiful and healthy soap both for children and parents, such soap that is a little work of art. It can be a great homemade gift!

Nadezhda with her elder son Silvestr

Parents' Ideas: Nadya, could you, please, tell us how you learnt that it is possible to make soap in home environment?

Nadezhda: I learnt about such soap by chance – saw it in the Internet. My sister presented me with a woolen set for children and when I was looking for the material about wool there was soap among the other woolen abundance. Very artistic and it attracted me immediately. There was soap rolled in wool and soap which was just soap.

 

Soap “A Tasty Thing”

P.I.: How did the idea to make soap occur to you? Читать дальше…

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Aquarelle Pencil Drawing with Children

There is an element of transformation in aquarelle pencil drawing which makes such kind of drawing a bit magic: there was a sketch in pencils and, in a minute, it is already an aquarelle painting. It is also very "convenient" to draw with aquarelle pencils with children: the kid is drawing both with pencils and a brush but the table, hands, cheeks, etc. stay clean.

Yesterday Soniya (22 mo) and I experimented with aquarelle pencils a bit (it was the first meeting with such pencils for our daughter). And here is what we've got: Читать дальше…

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Appliqué Work with Toddlers: 3 Cheerful Giraffes

A contest in one of the Russian collective blogs made me think that it would be a great idea to organize "theme evenings" for our child from time to time. One of the evenings of the previous week we devoted to the topic "Giraffe".

First of all, we examined the giraffes we'd got at home (photos, toys). Then, together with our daughter, we printed out three copies of the giraffe for colouring which I'd found in the Internet (the process of printing out is much fun for the toddler of 20 mo). And now we are ready to start our work: mummy's imagination plus Sonya's enthusiasm.

Applique Work "Giraffe" # 1: coffee, napkins and buckwheat

This appliqué work was made with the use of different materials. I wanted to use some "unordinary ingredients" (coffee, napkins, buckwheat) and our Soniya (22 mo) was very interested in

gluing. The appliqué work with a set contour turned out to be interesting not only for the fine motor skills but also for the developing of the feeling of space (you shouldn't go beyond the contour when gluing). I helped our daughter only a bit: with painting the giraffe's nose and gluing the buckwheat and coffee.

Our first giraffe appeared to be 3-D:

An illustrated tutorial from Soniya:: appliqué work "Giraffe" from napkins, coffee and buckwheat

You can make all the pics bigger clicking on them

Applique Work "Giraffe" # 2

The theme evening was prolonged for three days. Spontaneously as Soniya found the second printed copy of the giraffe and decided to decorate it with plasticine (modeling clay) herself. The choice of colours was totally hers. I asked her whether I could help her a bit and she, graciously , allowed.

The work in process:

This craft was also very useful for the developing of fine motor skills and the feeling of space.

Collage "Giraffe" # 3

One more evening – one more appliqué work on the subject "Giraffe". I found interesting photos of giraffes in the Internet (a baby giraffe drinking milk from a bottle, the one easting a "cake", walking giraffes, etc.) and, having arranged all of them on one sheet of paper, printed them out. We made a collage around the giraffe painted with Soniya's hand. When cutting out the pictures with giraffes, I asked Soniya which one she would like to glue next. Afterwards, we put dots with watercolours and a brusg onto the painted giraffe.

The work in process:

Anastasia

Here you can read this article in Russian

Illustrations to the article

Photos by the author of the article

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Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-03-21

• Painting with toddlers: art-balls http://eng.parentsideas.com/2009/08/painting-with-toddlers-art-balls/ #
• We tried a new painting technique: I drew with a candle on paper and our tot (22 mo) painted the sheet with watercolours. #ananas #
• We also draw with colour chalks on black construction paper, with finger paints put on small balls or images cut out of sponge. #ananas #
• We're modeling from clay. I start some image. Sonya "continues" sticking more and more pieces of clay. It means I've got free time #ananas #
• Out tot (22 mo) asks me to draw music. How? I draw notes. Then a man's singing is required. And once she called herself a note #ananas #

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Parents’ Ideas and The Crafty Crow

For almost a month already there has been The Crafts around the World series at the marvelous web-site The Crafty Crow. We, the authors of the Parents' Ideas were very honoured to introduce Russia in this Project presenting illustrated tutorials of a dish and a craft among such countries as India, Turkey, the Netherlands, South Africa and many others. We are very grateful to Cassi, the author of The Crafty Crow, for inviting us to participate in the Project.

If you'd like to learn more about Russia and to learn how to make typically Russian Clay Toys be sure to visit The Crafty Crow.

Anastasia and Natalie

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Russian Cuisine: Vareniki

Russians love making and eating vareniki – a kind of stuffed dumplings. When vareniki are being made collectively (by friends or members of the family, especially together with kids), it is so much fun to make and eat them!

Vareniki. Recipe

Ingredients for the dough:

500 gr flour, 1 egg, 2/3 glass of water, 1 teaspoon salt.

You can also use milk instead of water and add 2 teaspoon sugar for the vareniki with sweet stuffing.

Kinds of stuffing:

• Potatoes with onion (you can also add mushrooms);
• Sweet cottage cheese
• Cherry or strawberry with sugar
• Minced meat with onion
• Kraut with an egg

How to make vareniki:

Preparation of the dough:

Pour sifted flour on a large hardboard, make a hollow in the middle, beat an egg into it, pour warm water, salt and knead stiff dough.

Cover it with a napkin or a lid and leave it for 30-40 minutes.

Preparation of the stuffing:

Boil 8 potatoes in salted water.

Fry 2 chopped onions.

Mash the potatoes, mix them with the onion and add 1 egg.

Making vareniki:

Roll out the dough in a thin layer.

With a thin (wine) glass cut out circles. (Then I roll out each of the circles a little bit.)

Put the stuffing onto one half of the circle, cover it with the other side and pinch the edges together.

A proper varenik should look like this:

Boil vareniki in salted water. Serve warm with sour cream (and melted butter).

Vareniki can be also used for fortune-telling:

Despite Christianity being an "official" religion in Russia, Russians have always been a little bit pagan. The tradition of fortune-telling is still popular. One of the ways for fortune-telling is "through vareniki". The things you'll find in the stuffing will tell you about your future:

• pieces of tomato – for love
• coins – for money/wealth
• bay leaf – for job and fame
• a ring – for wedding
• a thread – for traveling

Anastasia and Natalie

Illustrations to the Article

photos by the authors of the "Parents' Ideas"

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Homemade Design Paper: an illustrated tutorial

While we were making cards in the network of our project "Homemade Cards and Gifts", our readers were sharing their tips and ideas with us. For example, reading about this card Nadezhda told us how to make design paper in home environment.

Homemade Design Paper

• "Tear soft colour napkins, tissue paper into
  

  small pieces (or as you like) and put them in a bowl .

• Pour a little water into the bowl (to get a dense mixture of water and the pieces of napkins) and add some glue.
• Cut out a square of the required size from a mesh (for example, from a mosquito screen).
• Put the mixture from the bowl onto the mesh with your hands. Spread it carefully about the mesh.
• You can also put some threads, leaves or whatever you like to decorate the paper.
• Hang the mesh with clothespins for it to get dry.
• When the paper has dried up, separate the mesh from it.

You can use design paper for making cards, decorating boxes, etc".

Of course, Soniya and I could not but make such design paper following Nadezhda's instructions. We hadn't got a mesh. So, I was thinking for a long time what to take instead of it and finally found the bags which potatoes and onions are sold in (not the best variant but it is fine for the first try).

We made all the stages of the process together with out little daughter (22 mo old).

We put the mixture onto the mesh which was lying on a plastic tray.

I arranged the tray with the mesh vertically leaning it against the wall (my initial attempt to hang it was not successful as the paper started falling down from the mesh).

Finally we got colourful construction paper (for a thinner result, I guess, we should have made a thinner layer of the wet pieces of napkins on the mesh and also, may be, tear the napkins into smaller pieces). And it's just occurred to me what else one can make from such design (construction) paper (after I've read Jean's article on Easter egg suncatches).

For example, one can cut out Easter eggs from such design construction paper and give them to relatives and friends on Easter or decorate some Easter gifts with them.

Anastasia and Natalie

You can read this article in Russian here.

Illustrations to the Article

Photos by the authors of "Parents' Ideas"

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Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-03-14

• A craft for kids of 1,5-4: we stuck leaves & flowers made of plasticine to broken branches. A cheerful spring activity! #ananas #
• How to make dolls in an egg shape http://zakkalife.blogspot.com/2009/03/craft-tutorial-hina-doll-set.html #
• We got much pleasure from our walk: fell down into the snow and compared our imprints – for 22 mo tot it is an important discovery! #ananas #
• After working with clay, our daughter was so-o peaceful as if she got positive energy from clay (natural material) #ananas #
• We modeled from clay with our 22 mo tot for the first time. I hadn't expected it would be so exciting for such a little one #ananas #

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Homemade Cards and Gifts: Catalog

The International Women's Day, March 8, has passed but the desire to create is still here!

Our project "Homemade Cards and Gifts – Interesting Ideas Every Day!" would not be complete if we did not share one more type of cards with you (which will finish our project). Such a card is both a card and a gift!

Homemade Embroidered Cards

Such a card will remind the person who you presented it with about it for a long time: thanks to its format, it is also a bookmark.

The materials which have been used:

• colour construction paper – for the card itself;
• a piece of velvet;
• colour threads, a needle and scissors.

Preparation:

• The picture is embroidered on velvet;
• The velvet is sewed to the construction paper with several stitches.

Creating such cards, one can make an embroidery not only on cloth but also on construction paper (but there should be construction paper of two colours: one for the background and one for the basis of the card). Such cards look very tender!

As our project has reached its final line, we decided to gather all the cards and gifts created by us in a catalog

Homemade cards

 Joy, love and beauty

 3D Cards

 Freshness of Foliage

 Card-mobile

 One from many

 Admiring Cherry-blossoming

 Love in everything

 Night velvet and early morning tenderness

Anastasia and Natalie

You can read this article in Russian here.

Ideas and Illustrations to the article

by the authors of “Parents' Ideas“

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