Making Frozen Snowflake Jewellery

My daughter loves anything Frozen themed at the moment (show me a four year old that doesn't!) so when we were sent the Craft Box Snowflake Jewellery Kit from Interplay to review I knew she would be delighted! This simple jewellery craft set is aimed at children aged four and above and contains everything you need to make ten pieces of sparkly child friendly jewellery that looks great with an Elsa dress for fun dress up play.

As with all Interplay kits, the box contains everything you need to get started, with an easy to follow illustrated instruction booklet, over 300 colourful beads, 10 beautiful snowflake charms, plastic stretch cord and 5 plastic clasps.

Elizabeth was thrilled when she saw the kit and couldn't wait to get started. Although the set is not Frozen branded as such, the colours and snowflake theme, immediately make you think of the hit Disney film and my daughter declared she was making an Elsa necklace and bracelet to wear with her Elsa dress when we go to see Disney on Ice later this month!

The beads included in the set come in a variety of shapes and colours, all with an icy feel to them. Elizabeth carefully chose the beads that she wanted to use and then settled on one of the ten metal charms to finish it off. I measured and cut the thread for her and after that she didn't need much more help until it came to tying the knots at the end. 

She really enjoyed the activity and was proud of herself for being able to create something that she really liked. I was impressed at her threading skills and would recommend a set like this for any child to practice their fine motor skills with. 

Elizabeth has decided to make some more bracelets for her friends and has promised one for me too!

The Craft Box Snowflake Jewellery Kit from Interplay offers great value with a lot of  play for the price and at the end you get a lovey keepsake. It is available for just £7.99 from Amazon
 and other good toy stores. This would make a great gift for a Frozen fan and a few kits would make the ideal activity at a Frozen themed birthday party!

The lovely folks at Interplay have given us another kit to giveaway to one of our readers, so if you think your little one would love to make some Snowflake bracelets then follow the instructions below.

Good Luck!

Win a Snowflake Jewellery kit

Five Fun Things to do with Conkers...

So it's officially Autumn! The leaves are beautiful shades of brown and the horse chestnuts are falling from the trees...

Nothing feels more autumnal to me than wrapping up warm and going on a hunt for conkers! My children were very excited to discover the huge horse chestnut tree (or Aesculus hippocastanum if you want to get all latin...) at the end of their grandparent's road. They set about filling their arms with a collection of shiny conkers from the same tree that their Daddy would have twenty odd years earlier. Hey who am I kidding? Daddy and I joined in too of course! I'm a big kid at a heart and I couldn't resist routing through the crisp amber leaves that covered the pavement to join the search...

A 'butterfly' shaped conker shell we found!

Collecting the conkers is great fun and a good excuse to get your children outside for some fresh air in the colder weather but it doesn't stop there! There are lots of different things that you can do with your conker collections from crafts to educational games. I've brought together my five favourite conker activities...

1. Play Conkers! 

Be traditional, choose your strongest looking conkers, make a hole, thread through some string or an old shoelace and challenge your bestie (or Daddy!) to a good old game of conkers! Red Ted Art has a great video to show you how to play

2. Science experiments!

Did you know that conkers contain a build up of steam? If you pierce them you can see this steam release or if you throw a conker on to  camp fire (adult supervision required, obviously!) then the build up will cause it to explode? There are lots of other was to experiment with conkers too, Science Sparks has a great experiment to find out how to make the strongest conker.

3. Sensory and Maths Play!

This is a great one for younger children who love to help collect up the conkers but are a little too young to play with them in the traditional way. Being so solid, shiny and of varying shapes they are ideal for sensory play. Thread them on strings to make 'worms' increasing in size by one and use them to help your children with counting. My Little 3 and Me have some great Baby and Toddler conker play ideas.

4. Make Halloween or Christmas Decorations!

It's always fun to get crafty with something you've found outside and conkers make an ideal base for a simple hanging decoration. Add some googly eyes and black or silver pipe cleaners to make a spider ideal for getting in the Halloween theme. Or why not get glittery and make a sparkly conker bauble and maybe get your child to paint their initial on it? Or add some felt and cotton wool to make a Santa head?

5. Painting with Conkers

  Conkers are so shiny, they are ideal for getting messy with paint! This is a fun messy play activity for children of all ages! There are a few great ways to paint with conkers and I love how The Imagination Tree uses Rolling Conker Art to make gorgeous swirling patterns on paper that would be ideal for wrapping up gifts!

Finally, this isn't an activity but something I have just learnt... Did you know that Conkers contain a chemical that spiders hate? Pop a few bowls of conkers in the corners of your rooms and you may prevent those creepy crawlies coming in to your house! You could evening string them up and hang them from your windows, pretty and practical!

If you are looking for even more ideas using conkers check out this post at From Little Things and don't forget Pinterest, I love this Autumn Activities board from This Day I love.


What do you do with conkers? I'd love to hear your ideas...

Back to School Crafting with Sainsbury's

We love the summer holidays, full of days out, quality family time and crafting. but it's not long until the school term starts again and we have o get back in to the routine again...

A couple of weeks ago a exciting parcel full of craft supplies arrived on our doorstep and both Ben who will be seven next week and moving up to juniors in September and his little sister Elizabeth who is excited about Pre school couldn't wait to get started. Sainsbury's had sent us a selection of their Get Creative craft range to get crafty along the back to school theme.

I spoke to Ben about returning to school in September and asked him what he was looking forward to the most. He started off telling me how exciting it wold be going in to the juniors and how he would be one of the big boys now and would have to be very good to set and example to the younger children and hep them in they were sad. He told me all about the new play ground he would get to play football on and his new classroom, but the thing he was most excited about was lunch time! (Yes he is his father's son!)

It was not just the food he was looking forward to but the time socialising with his friends, chatting about turtles and Skylanders and sharing stories of the exciting adventures they'd got up to over the summer. He couldn't wait to tell them about going camping with the scouts where he helped to make bivvies and cook dinner on an open fire!

Soon though we were back to food and he was talking about what his favorite packed lunches were. Although many children will be changing to hot dinners this September due to the introduction of free meals for infant children, Ben will still be taking  his 'mini picnics' as he calls them.

We decided to make a crafty version of his favourite lunch!

Using a selection of the Sainsburys craft supplies that we had been sent we created a super healthy packed lunch, including...

An Apple

Carrot sticks with hummous

Orange juice

and Ben's favourite; Cheese, lettuce and tomato Sandwich!

Ben cut pieces of coloured craft foam up into shaped to represent bread, cheese, tomato and lettuce and then using coloured pipe cleaners he joined them all together.

We decided that it looked like a book so Ben used felt tips and glitter pens to write the names of each ingredient on the foam and create a mini sandwich book.

Both he and Elizabeth have since spent lots of time playing with the book they made!

So simple, yet great fun!

We also used some of the other craft supplies to create 3D Elsa picture, make our own boardgame and a star mosaic.

I was really impressed with the quality of the art supplies from the Sainsbury's get creative range and they have given us all hours of fun!

Have you been chatting to your children about going back to school? What are they looking forward to the most?


We were sent these craft items free of charge and a gift card for taking part in the challenge.

Hama Bead Jewellery Bowl - Mother's Day Crafts

You may have noticed we've become slightly Hama Bead obsessed in the My Mummy's Pennies house recently, they are a great fun, low cost craft material with almost endless possibilities so why not?

One thing I especially love about crafting with Hama Beads is that it appeals to both my children despite a 3 year age difference. Ben is six with co-ordination and fine motor difficulties so crafting with small beads is great for developing these skills, he also has a great creative flare and a love of patterns which can be expressed when crafting with Hama. Hama beads are also ideal for supporting his school work and we have recently been using them to help him visual his times tables.

My daughter is 3 and so far hasn't shown any of the developmental delays that Ben did, she is a whizz at popping the little beads on the peg boards and also loves creating patterns. We use Hama beads as an educational tool with her too, identifying colours and counting out the beads.

So anyway on to today's craft which would be ideal as a mothers day gift... (note to any Dad's who have left things to the last minute, send Mum off for a soak in the bath tomorrow and get crafty with the kids!)

Hama beads are ideal for children from aged three upwards but for some younger children filling a peg board can test their patience, so a great way to use them is to make Hama bead bowls.

I remember seeing this post from Lucy's Madhouse a while ago and it inspired me to try out something similar.

I have a few pieces of jewellery that I wear every day and take off when I go to bed at night, at the moment I just dump them on my bedside table but they can often slide off onto the floor so I've been wanting a nice little jewellery bowl to keep them in.

This is a really simple craft that I did together with my three year old daughter...

Step one

Find an ovenproof bowl and lightly grease it with oil

Step two 

Pour in the Hama Beads. We decided to do our bowl in the shape of a flower, so we separated our beads into different colours, and poured each colour in separately. We then shaped the outdide to look like petals and used cream beads to make and outline just one bead thick, along the edge of the petals. We also used a few cream beads in the centre to make the middle of the flower.

Step three

Bake!

Pop in a preheated oven at around 200 degrees for around 5 - 10 minutes but do keep an eye on it and keep checking as it will vary depending on how large your bowl is.

Step four

Allow to cool, When the bowl comes out of the over the beads will still be soft and very hot so wait until the bowl has cooled down completely and the beads have hardened before trying to remove as not only could you get a nasty burn you will bend your beads right out of shape!

So there we go; a lovingly made Mother's Day gift in four easy steps!

You could make these in different shapes and sizes and for a multitude of uses!

Do let me know what you make! I would love to see your creations...

This craft was made with beads we bought our self but the lovely folks at DKL Toys have sent us some sets to have fun with so look out for reviews of these coming very soon and why not check out the great selection of Hama sets on their website?

Join us for the #myfirstcrayolaparty next week!

Yesterday I arrived home from work to a big box of goodies from Crayola! On Monday (10th June) we will be hosting a #myfirstcrayolaparty with our children and their friends and then we will be joining Danielle from BlogbyBaby and some other lovely mummy bloggers on twitter from 8pm to share our thoughts on these lovely goodies for creative toddlers...

The items we have been sent are...

My First Markers and My First Character Markers

My First Colour and Flip Books

My First Colouring & Sticker Books

My First Musical Rub Art Station

They all look fantastic and I can't wait to see what my daughter and her friends think of them!

I will be sharing reviews of each product and we will all be discussing them at the Twitter party so do join us from 8pm on Monday 10th June with the hashtag #myfirstcrayolaparty!

If you fancy trying some out for yourself you can enter to Win some goodies by clicking here.

80/365

80/365 an Easter bonnet for Elizabeth's first parade...

Last Minute Christmas Gifts without leaving the house...

So all the shopping is done almost all wrapped and you're secretly smug when you see friends status updates saying they've left it all to the last minute and are having to rush round the shops battling the crowds and searching for a gifts on the empty shelves...

But then a disaster occurs! You've missed someone out ( or just found out your brother in law is bringing his new girlfriend for Christmas Dinner / or were so organised buying you Dad's present in July that you can't actually find it!) It's Christmas Eve, you want a lazy day in with the children, playing games, watching movies and preparing tomorrows veg, the last thing you want to do is traipse around the shops with the little ones in tow, fighting through all the last minute shoppers after being so prepared...

And you can't even order online even amazon prime won't get it to you on time now!!

Is the only option to run out to the corner shop and see if they have a box of chocs that could pass for half decent?

There are some alternatives!

Why not make it an activity with the children and bake a present? We made these lovely Festive Gingerbread cookies for the teachers at Ben's School and nursery staff at Elizabeth's nursery and today we will be making simple vanilla chocolate truffles as gifts for family members from the children. Great fun and hardly costs anything either so great if you're saving your money to spend in the sales!

If baking isn't your bag then why not get a voucher that you can print at home? From an experience gift at  Buyagift to a wide variety of things at Groupon including family days out, meals and even getaways, or if you think they'd prefer some music or a book then why not Amazon? Simply print it out and they can choose what to spend it on!!

All of the above offer the option of e-vouchers on their website, simply purchase and print off and you have a gift in seconds! To make it extra special, why not let your children get crafty and make a card to put the voucher in?

So don't panic, it may be Christmas Eve but you can still get some great gifts from the comfort of your own home!

12 Days of Christmas Toys - On the fifth day of Christmas...

So it's getting to the point where you can't really deny it any more, Christmas is well and truly on it's way, before you know it, the presents will be unwrapped, the dinner eaten and the living room scattered with toys. So for those of you who are still looking for the perfect toys for your family, that hopefully won't be discarded in favour of the wrapping paper, over the next 12 days I am going to be featuring  a variety of toys aimed at a range of ages from toddler to teen.

We will also have some giveaways to help you get an extra present under the tree!

On the fifth  day of Christmas my true love  Santa gave to me...

five gold rings

Deluxe Charm Bracelets from Interplay

With my children being younger I find it difficult to choose presents for my niece who is fits into the 'tween'  age group. But the new myStyle craft kits from Interplay seem perfect! As well as appealing to the mini fashionista in her they also encourage crafts and creativity!

The myStyle collection is a must-have amongst girls looking to design and create professional quality accessories whilst keeping true to their own individual style. The Mystyle DeLuxe Charm Bracelets  do just that, allowing girls to design and make beautiful silver charm bracelets, almost identical to leading designer brands, but at a fraction of the price! The kit has an RRP of £19.99 and with enough contents to   make 40 pretty colourful beads I think this is great value.

MyStyle is all about encouraging girls to express their own individual style whilst ensuring they have the perfect piece of jewellery or special gift for every occasion! These kits make the perfect christmas  present for any style-conscious tween who wants to ensure she is glamourized with fine creations in time for New Year’s Eve...

Silent Sunday...