Mother's Day Ideas

You've all probably planned your Mother's Day events by now (if not, why not?) but just in case you haven't, or if you've still got room to add and change your programme then I figured I'd throw out a few ideas.

As an event which celebrates part of the family unit, Mother's Day is a fantastic opportunity for encouraging families to work for each other and with each other.

Some fun ideas that I've had over the years;

- an event that encourages kids to bring their Dad to make something for Mum as a present. This works particularly well when they're doing an activity that Dad will probably feel plays to his strength, such as making a picture frame (Dad's are responsible for supervising the gluing of the wood together for the frame, the kids can take the lead on the painting-and-sticking decoration).

- making bath salts in glass jars as a gift for Mum. This is so easy even very small children can do it, as essentially they're just mixing in colours and scents in a giant mixing bowl and then decanting it into glass jars. Make sure you buy cosmetic grade epsom salts, colours and scents so that they're bath safe. Personalise the activity more by having the children decorate the jar with labels, ribbons and so on.

- making Mother's Day cards. A tip; don't run this activity on Mother's Day itself, as most people have already given their cards by then! If you're going to make cards, do it in the week or weekend before. This sort of activity would work very well with groups of children. There are lots of types of cards you can make, but I find the pop-up flower cards are excellent for Mother's Day, as are the paper tissue flowers with pipe cleaner stems.

- encourage Mum and children to share memories and play together with a special trail. Ask children and their mum to tell each other what their favourite object in a room is, or get them to pick an object and explain it to one another. Play i-spy, twenty questions or other games, using the museum as the starting point. Some of these work well even with older children.

- make Mum medals. Rosettes, made with paper or ribbon, are a lot of fun and fairly easy to make though they can be time consuming. Rosettes can be made to say 'Happy Mother's Day', 'Best Mum', 'I Love You' or anything else at all.

There's just a few suggestions there but hopefully its given you some ideas.

If you'd like step by step instructions for any of the crafts I've mentioned please just ask, and I've sometimes got trail or worksheet templates as well so shout if you'd like them.

If you've got a topic you'd like me to cover in a how-to post, just drop me a line on twitter @Sarah_Fellows or here on the blog and I'll see what I can do!

Ten things you can do with a piece of paper

I'm of the firm opinion that you can make pretty much anything out of paper, given enough time and rolls of sellotape. Over the years, we've tried to do just that at our events and activity days, always coming up with new uses for the scrap paper that would otherwise get thrown away.

Of course, the best thing about paper? It's recyclable! So once you're finished crafting, you can just pop into into the recycle bin.

So, I thought today I'd share ten things you can make with a piece of paper (or two or three). These are just some of the most fun or the most useful; I'd love to hear what papery creations other people have made!

Especially for today, I've even included some pictures of some of these papery crafts. I think they're all pretty self explanatory really, but if you want any making instructions for anything just drop me a line and I'll be happy to share!

1. A paper aeroplane

It doesn't matter how old you are, a paper aeroplane is always a winner. As you'll see from the picture here, we've made some pretty big paper aeroplanes, some just as large as the children we made them with! These uber-planes don't fly all that well, to be honest, but the kids absolutely love them anyway.

2. Hats

You can make pretty much any type of hat you like from a sheet or two of paper. The usual suspects for us include witch and wizard hats, pirate hats and princess hats, but the only limit is usually the child's imagination (which you'll know is pretty limit-less).

3. Masks
We've made masks on pretty much every theme you can think of. Animals, transport, and yes, aliens. The great thing about masks is that they're so simple, and yet you can spend hours and hours getting it just how you want it. When I say "you", let's pretend we mean the children and not the staff, ok?

4. Paper towers

These are great fun for a construction-based event, and best run as a team activity. I love how competitive parents and grandparents get when they're trying to see who can build the biggest tower.

5. Snowflakes

Great for winter or weather events, and they make fantastic Christmas decorations. The look on a child's face the very first time they see one opened up is priceless.

6. Musical instruments

We've made horns, wobble boards (thanks Rolf), shakers, drums, rainmakers and more from rolls and balls of paper. It's surprising how much extra noise children can make with a few sheets of paper, really.

7. Phoenix Feathers

Or indeed, any feathers at all. The phoenix himself is made of cardboard cut to shape and stuck together, then covered in toilet paper and spray painted red. He's a fantastic model, and over a year later he's still hanging in the store cupboard.

8. Secret message envelopes

These are great fun. We make them from greaseproof paper because it comes on a roll which is nice and convenient, but you could make them from normal paper too. A couple of folds in the right places and you have an envelope with a secret compartment! What could be better for a budding spy?

9. Models

Because paper is so fantastically easy to fold, you can make nets of pretty much any shape out of them. We built an entire village onto a hand-drawn paper map to demonstrate the ideas of town planning, including buildings which families made out of rectangles and triangular prisms. We had some remarkably inventive building designs; as well as the the mini museum you can see below we had houses, supermarkets, a school, a church and a cathedral.

10. A bin!

Yes, we've made bins out of paper before. These are excellent if you know you're doing a paper craft that has a lot of paper off cuts. Just make sure that you don't put any non-paper in the bin, and you can put the entire thing straight into the recycling when you're done. How's that for efficient?