Green Crafts

Homemade recycled cardboard castle craft project

Here's a craft project that can be used for home, homeschool, Sunday School, CCD, classroom and youth theater: a cardboard castle.

To start, make cardboard castle walls. Cut open two large, recycled cardboard refrigerator boxes. Tape boxes together to make an octagon castle "keep." Cut windows and castle battlements. Castle walls had a series of crenelations and merlons (squared edge thingys) along the top.

Decorate cardboard castle. Draw in bricks and family crest. Make medieval drawbridge by cutting a flap in the side of cardboard castle. Attach yarn to both sides of to lower and raise drawbridge. Cut holes in the top to tie drawbridge closed. Place blue and green blankets around the outside for the castle moat. Fill with stuffed animal dragons, fish, alligators and other aquatic creatures.

Make secret entrances. Line chairs up to make a crawl-through tunnel entrance into castle. Drape sheets, blankets and bed linens over tunnel. Establish cardboard castle dungeon. Make a parapet (walkway) by placing several chairs or a bench along the inside edge of the castle. Soldiers keep lookout here and send prisoners to sit under the chairs in the dungeon sit under bench. Fashion a turret. Put a collapsible net laundry hamper upside down on a chair inside the castle. Children crawl into hamper and onto chair to look out of the turret. Help kids make hobby horses from old brooms to play knight.

Recycled Holiday Crafts For Kids: Thanksgiving, Christmas, Kwanzaa, and Chanukah

Parents, do the holidays find you up to your eyebrows in kids and work? Why not put those vacationing youngsters to work making crafts, greeting cards and decorations for Thanksgiving, Christmas, Kwanzaa, Chanukah, or whatever winter holidays you celebrate? These cheap, green homemade crafts save money using recycled materials while keeping preschool kids productively busy and helping prep for your celebration. Recycled Holiday Crafts For Kids: Thanksgiving, Christmas, Kwanzaa, and Chanukah

Spooky-licious scary food recipes: ghoulishly gruesome Halloween party foods

Hosting a Halloween party? Want to scare up ghoulishly gruesome (but spooky-licious) snacks your little hob-goblins? These spooky snack recipes guaranteed will gross out the bravest guest. Set up DIY make-your-own snacks and get double duty of party foods and crafts. Or do triple duty with a game thrown in. Organize them by Halloween creature. Play a blindfold touch and feel game. Have guests guess what foods are. Set out labels so guests know what creepy confections they ate.

Ghosts

--flesh: marshmallows

--guts: marshmallow fluff or vanilla frosting

--ghost guts cookies: pinwheel cookies

--blood: milk

--brains dipped in ghost blood: raw cauliflower dipped in ranch dressing

Vampires

--teeth: red apple wedges dipped in Hershey's Strawberry Syrup (blood)

--bloody fingers : hot dogs with ketchup

Haunted Jack-o-Lantern

--pumpkin blood: orange juice

Bats

--teeth: black and orange candy corn

--wings: grape fruit leather or prunes

Mummies

--brains: popcorn (being dried out, mummy brains are shrively and crumbled.

--people mummies brains: make popcorn balls with marshmallows and red M&Ms.

--cat mummy brains: popcorn and red M&Ms (Egyptians loved their cats and mummified them).

--zombie Barbie brains: whole walnuts

--wrappings: cotton candy

--guts: assorted dried fruit

--hearts and ears: pretzels

Skeletons

--fingers: mozzarella cheese sticks or pretzel rods

--faces: yogurt-covered pretzels

Witches

--brains: broccoli

--blood: milk and green food coloring, limeade

--guts: pistachio pudding or guacamole (serve with tortilla chips called dragon scales)

--eyes: green grapes or sliced kiwi

--Witches' brew: mulled spiced apple cider. Have children watch as you describe and prepare. Heat monster blood (apple cide) with eye of newt (whole cloves), dragon claws (cinnamon bark), Slenderman eyes (lemon slices), toad eyes (raisins), dash of skeleton paste (butter) and ground scorpion (nutmeg).

--Witch blood slushies: frozen honey dew melon or kiwi, blended with Greek yogurt and lemonade.

Miscellaneous

--Frankenstein --Nuts and Bolts: Chex Mix or Cheerios Trail Mix

--zombie sandwiches (as in for, not made of): Sliced lunchmeat (brain cross-section) sandwiches with guts and blood (mustard and ketchup).

--eye slices: sliced kiwi or cucumber

--werewolf gut and blood sandwiches: PBJ sandwiches

--toasted spider legs: chow mien noodles
For tons more Halloween activities visit Halloween Harvest & October and for recipes come to Great Food 4u. Need educational printables try Free Printable Lesson Plans and for holiday cards try Free Printable Cards 4U

Patriotic drinks recipes: bomb pops, RWB cocktails, beer and wine: American-themed adult beverages

Who says food can't be art? Certainly not Pinterest! And Labor Day is just the time to get creative with the patriotic drinks recipes. "Crafts" some red white and blue cocktails and American themed shots and recipes. Use these festive American holiday-themed alcoholic beverages for 4th of July, Flag Day and Memorial Day too.

RWB Bomb Pop: Slush (partially freeze) separately: Dekuyper's Raspberry Pucker, cherry liqueur or Bacardi Razz, blue Curacao and Smirnoff ice (or lemonade, vodka or gin). Add slush in layers with red on bottom, clear in middle and blue on top.

Red, White and Brew: Are your party-goers a beer crowd? Then why not spike those beers with a shot of red or blue food coloring for a fun Fourth of July look? Hey, bars dye beer green for St. Patrick's Day--why not blue beer or red beer for America's birthday? Amber beers are already reddish in color. Hopheads will love Founders Red's Rye IPA. Lagunitas Imperial Red is a maltier beer. Or Redd's Apple Ale is getting quite a following.

Red Wine and Blue: Serve your wine loving guests an assortment of wines. Select a rich, dry red like Malbec or Shiraz and a sweet red Lambrusco. Moscato or Reisling are nice sweet whites wines and chardonnay is a delicious dry white. For blue white, add a little grape juice to a sweet white. Or bust out good old Boone's Farm Blue Hawaiian just for fun!

Red Hot White Lightning Blues: Put a kick in your patriotic punch bowl. Blend cranberry juice, grapefruit soda, Dekuyper's Raspberry Pucker, vodka (one shot of liqueur and alcohol to each 8 ounce serving of juice). Freeze blue gelatin or clear soda in star-shaped ice cube trays.

Rum White and Beach Cooler: This is a 4th of July spin on a traditional New Orleans Hurricane recipe. Blend blue Hi-C fruit punch, limeade, Dekuyper's Blue Curacao and Malibu coconut rum. Garnish with strawberry and apple slices cut in star shapes.

Star-Spangled Sangria: In a pitcher, blend one bottle dry red wine (Merlot or Cabernet Sauvignon) one 2 liters grapefruit soda, one 12-ounce can lemonade and a fifth of Dekuyper's Peach Schnapps. Freeze Dekuyer's Blue Curacao in star-shaped ice cubes. Slice oranges, lemons and limes and cut in star shapes with cookie cutter.

Ruby White and Blue Solitaire shot (slush or regular): My then-boyfriend was a bartender. He gave me a ruby solitaire as a promise ring. This drink is named for that ring. 100% Cranberry Juice cocktail (Ocean Spray is a good brand.) DeKuyper Peachtree Schnapps.

lemon twist, strawberry and blueberry bowtie for garnish. Freeze the cranberry juice until it slushes. Place in a covered ice bucket or cooler. Mix one shot of Schnapps with four oz. of cranberry juice.

American Woman (aka Bahama Mama, a drink from my conga line days). In a shaker, blend, shots of Malibu Coconut Rum, Suntory Midori (melon liquor) and 4-6 ounces Dole Orange-Peach-Mango or Dole Pine-Orange-Banana). Garnish with pale green honeydew melon chunk, strawberry, blueberry for RWB bowtie.

Blue Motorcycle: My now-husband used to ride a Union Jack blue 1970 Triumph Daytona; this drink is a tribute to that bike.Mix one ounce each of vodka, rum and Blue Curacao liquor. Add four ounces Vernor's (the original American soda) or Squirt grapefruit soda.

Star-Spangled Brain: This novelty was an early shot. It looks like a squirrels' brain (hence the name) but tastes delicious. Fill a Collins glass half full of Dekuyper Strawberry or Pucker Raspberry Schnapps. Slowly dribble in one-two ounces of Bailey's Irish Cream to make "brain."

Stripy Stars Slammer: Another early shot, you slam the glass on the table and drink in one gulp. Slamming releases CO2 and makes froth. It isn't necessary to literally slam the glass. Just pick it up with one hand, cover it with the other hand and set down firmly on the table. 1 oz tequila, 1 ounce pink champagne, 4 ounces Vernor's.

Ein Prosit! L'Chaim! Sainte! Salud! Nastrovya! Skol! Opah and all that. But if you drink this Memorial Day, don't drive.

Free printable Valentines Day crafts, valentine activities for kids

At each holiday, there are a few good websites to check for free printable holiday greeting cards, crafts, party decorations and coloring pages. Here are the best free printable Valentines Day crafts, greeting cards, valentines for classroom exchanges and children's Valentine's Day activities.

Start at The Toymaker for whimsical, Victorian-inspired Valentine's Day crafts. This link takes you to the Holidays - Valentine's Day page, but be sure to check out all the free printable toys, stories, games, crafts, cut and paste, holiday activities and novelties for children. The Toymaker, whose name is Marilyn makes all these free printables herself. For Valentine's Day crafts, there are free printable valentines greeting cards, treat boxes, a cute elephant valentine holder, valentine ornaments, a Celtic Valentine's Day treat box, a pixie box, door hangers, party decorations and more. These free printable crafts are perfect for preschool, homeschool, classroom and nursing home craft activities. Remember senior friends at Valentines Day when you exchange greeting cards.

Free printable brings you the best of web in freebies to print. This links takes you to the free printable valentines, just perfect for children's Valentine's Day exchanges. There are cute valentines with animals, hearts, frogs, flowers, dinosaurs and more. There are Valentine games, puzzles, decorations and other crafts, too. Be sure to scroll around for the multitude of other free printables.

Free Kids Crafts is another great free printable crafts clearinghouse. Sign up for the newsletter to see what great new activities are available. The link takes you to the first page of free printable valentines and Valentine's Day crafts. This page has 12 different styles of valentine crafts. Note that this is just the first page--there are four more pages of free printable valentines greeting cards and crafts alone (not to mention all the stuff to print for other holidays. Print valentines with animals, cartoons, hearts, candy, toys and more. You can make free printable Valentine's Day bookmarks, treat holders, paper glasses, party decorations, games, activities and more.

Teachers and homeschool parents, bookmark these sites for free printable party crafts, but also for that student who may have forgotten (or couldn't afford) to buy valentines to share with the class. Don't let her miss out on the valentine exchange fun--print off some valentines for her to fill out and distribute. I worked in high school special needs classroom. On Valentine's Day, many students still wanted to participate in valentine exchanges, but were deemed "too old." They were delighted when I printed valentines for them to make when their classwork was done.

Free Thanksgiving holiday crafts, games, greeting cards, coloring pages, printables

Do you love the Thanksgiving holiday? For some folks, it's the favorite of the holiday season. If you're a penny pincher who doesn't spend money on decorations and party supplies, yet likes to decorate, here are free printable Thanksgiving Day and seasonal decorations, Crafts, coloring pages and party games. Kids will love making greeting cards from holiday printables. Get Halloween and Christmas printables too. Pumpkin carving patterns, snowflake templates and more. Free Thanksgiving holiday crafts, games, greeting cards, coloring pages, printables

Mothers Day gift crafts for kids: Homemade photo frames, picture frame crafts | Examiner.com

Need inexpensive Mothers Day gift crafts for kids to make? Here are tutorials for homemade photo frames and gift crafts that teach measurement, geometry and other math skills. These Mothers Day gift crafts for kids are easy, economical, and eco-friendly. You will repurpose and reuse a lot of recycled trash in homemade photo frames and spend next to nothing! Mothers Day gift crafts for kids: Homemade photo frames, picture frame crafts | Examiner.com

Mothers Day gift crafts for kids: Homemade photo frames, picture frame crafts

Harry Potter wizard chemistry magic tricks, science experiments from literature

March is National Reading Month and one of the best adventure series for kids is Harry Potter. Would you like to make has some wizard magic like Harry Potter? He can't do magic outside Hogwarts but you can with these chemistry magic tricks and wizard science experiments. Hocus pocus up some Harry Potter fun with kitchen science experiments. Teachers and homeschool parents, impress, educate and engage apprentice wizards with these chemistry magic tricks from Harry Potter. Use these weird science experiments for a Harry Potter Halloween party! Children's literature selections are given for follow up. Harry Potter wizard chemistry magic tricks, science experiments from literature | Examiner.com

Homemade shoebox dioramas: Social studies crafts, science projects, book reports

It's 8 pm and darling daughter is wailing. She forgot to make her book report diorama project and it's due TOMORROW! Have you been there, done that, parents? Were you tempted to tell her "tough luck. You were told to do your homework and didn't. So take the F." Perhaps you wanted--like this mom did-- to put her on the street wearing a sign "free-- please take." But I am an eleventh hour girl myself and understood. So we bailed out Last Minute Lucy out. The whole family helped--dad and three older teen siblings. We made an awesome woodland Native American Indian diorama with stuff around the house--and made happy family bonding memories. From that experience grew this guide to making homemade shoebox dioramas for social studies crafts, science projects or book reports. All you need is a recycle bin, craft scraps, household junk and a little ingenuity. Homemade shoebox dioramas: Social studies crafts, science projects, book reports | Examiner.com

Free printable Spiderwick Chronicles lesson plans: Fantasy books coloring pages | Examiner.com

March is National Reading Month, time to focus on the best in children's literature. Today's featured genre is woodland folklore fantasy books. Does your spine tingle at the mention of sprites, pixies, brownies, ogres, hobgoblins, faeries and gryphons? Then "The Spiderwick Chronicles" is just the book series/movie for you! The first book Spiderwick Chronicles: The Field Guide just celebrated its 10th birthday. Holly Black and Tony DiTerlizzi wrote and illustrated the The Spiderwick Chronicles. There are five more Spiderwick Chronicles stories: The Seeing Stone, Lucinda's Secret, The Ironwood Tree and The Wrath of Mulgarath. Spiderwick is Lord of the Rings for elementary school. There are three more books from Beyond the Spiderwick Chronicles called The Nixie's Song, A Giant Problem and The Wyrm King. Free printable Spiderwick Chronicles lesson plans: Fantasy books coloring pages

Homemade gifts and crafts using recycled valentines, wrapping paper

Did your little Miss take her neatly-labeled valentines to school and arrive home with reciprocal Valentine cards from friends? So now, what to do with these prized missives? Clean freaks will toss when she isn't looking. Sentimental (ahem, packrat) parents will urge saving. Artsy (messy) moms won't know what happens to valentines because they will filter into general room litter. None of these is very satisfying considering cost, work and love put into valentines. Here are five cheap, homemade crafts using recycled and repurposed children's valentines. Perfect to use as gift crafts for Easter, Teacher Appreciation Month, Mother's Day, Father's Day or Grandparent birthday gift. Mothers Day gifts, homemade crafts using recycled valentines

Arts and crafts party for kids: Recycled crafts, DIY children's craft projects

Kids love playing in snow. But below-zero winter wind chills force parents to keep kids in the house. Schools cancel recess if it's too cold. Excess time spent cooped up, makes for restless, irritable children. Looking for cheap, indoor activities for bored, winterbound kids? How about an arts and crafts party for kids? Here are cheap recycled crafts and children's craft projects to occupy sick, snowbound or bored kids. Arts and crafts party for kids: Recycled crafts, DIY children's craft projects

Free printable holiday color-your-own greeting cards coloring pages

Parents, you know how it's hard to keep kids occupied productively. And you know how bored kids get into mischief. Work-at-home and stay-at-home parents have it doubly tough. Then add to that a holiday, and you have antsy children, underfoot, making preparations even harder. Well, don't despair. Here are boredom busters for kids--free printable color-your-own greeting cards. Put busy-body kids to work making cards to send and share. Use these holiday coloring pages to engage kids in holiday preparations, making decorations. These links have greeting cards to print and color, for all holidays. Free printable holiday color-your-own greeting cards coloring pages

Free printable Catholic crafts, Bible bingo, Christian games, religious puzzles | Examiner.com

The Catholic liturgical year heads into Lent on Feb. 10, 2016. In this most solemn and meaningful season, Catholic school teachers, religious education instructors, homeschool parents will enjoy these free printable Catholic crafts, Christian games, religious puzzles and activities. Use these for lesson plans, party games, holy day activities and family fun. Free printable Catholic crafts, Bible bingo, Christian games, religious puzzles | Examiner.com

Free printable Chinese New Year of the Monkey activities, Spring Festival crafts

February 8 celebrates Chinese New Year of the Monkey 2016. Each year in the 12-year Chinese zodiac, a different spirit animal is honored as are people born under that animal sign (in 2016, 2004, 1992, 1980, 1968, 1956 and on back through the multiples of 12). Greet each other on February 8 with the traditional Chinese New Year blessing "Gung Hay Fat Choy!" Chinese New Year is part of the Spring Festival and ends with the Lantern Festival. Looking for free printable Chinese New Year of the Monkey activities? Here are CNY crafts, coloring pages, greeting cards, Spring Festival lesson plans, Lantern Festival crafts and more. Print Chinese zodiac crafts, animal crafts, party decorations, CNY games and puzzles and lots more. Free printable Chinese New Year of the Monkey activities, Spring Festival crafts

Christmas presents: Inexpensive, personalized holiday gift baskets under $15

Holiday gift baskets make idea Christmas presents for everyone on your holiday shopping list. Gift baskets can be personalized and made inexpensively. Giving gift baskets cuts costs but also subtracts from your workload. Here's how: list every person who will get gift baskets and decide upon a theme for each, based upon favorite hobbies or interests. Streamline personalized Christmas gift baskets by including like items in each recipient's gift basket. Here are six items to include in everyone's gift basket, with variations personalized for each. Christmas presents: Inexpensive, personalized holiday gift baskets under $15

Free printable Advent wreath crafts for children to make

Advent is the four-week season before Christmas, celebrated by Catholics, Orthodox and some protestant Christian denominations. Most people think of Advent calendars with candies and treats. But that, like a commercial Christmas, is miles from the real purpose.. Advent is a lesser penitential season, a minor Lent. Christians observe spiritual acts of prayer, fasting and charity. They follow Bible-based Advent calendars and count down to Christmas reflecting on Jesus. One evangelical pastor is pushing protestant churches to celebrate Advent and put Christ back in Christmas, said Time magazine, Dec. 1. Free printable Advent wreath crafts for children to make | Examiner.com

Free printable children's Advent calendars and Christmas countdown crafts | Examiner.com

Advent begins four Sundays before Christmas. During Advent we focus on prayer, fasting and almsgiving in preparation for the Feast of Christmas. Many people use an Advent calendar to countdown to Christmas. Here are free printable advent calendars for children. Advent calendars feature little windows that are numbered. Children open one window each day before Christmas. Some advent calendars have a Bible verse that follows the Christmas story of Jesus's birth in Bethlehem.Free printable children's Advent calendars and Christmas countdown crafts

Free printable gingerbread house patterns and recipes, Christmas craft stencils | Examiner.com

Making holiday gingerbread houses is a favorite family traditions. Not being very artistic, I'd cheat and get the gingerbread house kit. But I've found a better way: free printable gingerbread house patterns, recipes and templates. People approach gingerbread house making in two ways. The first is to painstakingly design a work of art--not to be eaten, let alone touched. Then there's our youngest son's method: slap together a ramshackle gingerbread shed, lather in two inches of frosting, cover every inch in candy and devour immediately. Whichever school you subscribe to, you'll want these free printable gingerbread recipes, templates and patterns.Free printable gingerbread house patterns and recipes, Christmas craft stencils | Examiner.com