My four-year old and I began our Sunday morning by cleaning out and organizing his art shelves. In the midst of doing this, we came across a few scenes from Where the Wild Things Are meant for a project that did not turn out, despite high hopes. Rather than recycling the pictures, I moved them from here to there, since everything can be used for a craft. When the art shelves were organized, we started cutting out these saved pictures. I took out the new roll of contact paper. And suddenly we were making Christmas ornaments.
One thing led to another, and Henry and I found ourselves back at the computer, searching for scenes from his favorite books. Thank you, Google Images. A few times, Henry would run back to his room and scan his bookshelf, then run back and tell me which books we loved. Oh, yes! I'd say. And we'd find more.
Then we printed, cut, sandwiched each between clear contact paper, cut and taped string and voila! we have lovely little literary ornaments. Quite a few, actually. Perhaps some will become presents for his teachers?
It was a good project because Henry could take part fully in each step, from selecting the pictures, to cutting them out, to measuring the string and taping it to the back. When he wanted to try a different step, I continued working on the step I was on. The last step of hanging the ornaments on the tree was very fulfilling. He chose several to hang on the little tree in his bedroom, too, which is definitely the mark of a successful project.
This is not necessarily a super creative project, but we enjoyed doing it, and I'm glad that we've commemorated the books we have loved so well. I most enjoyed his picking out the pictures and hearing him tell me the part of the story associated with the picture, as I didn't realize, though I should have, how closely he has been listening--and memorizing--as we read and re-read. His favorite part of the project seemed to be pulling the tape off the dispenser and wrangling the embroidery thread into ornament loops.
These could serve nicely as gift-tags, too, though I don't know that the time-investment would be worth it, especially if you don't require an oath that gift-receivers will keep the tags.
Here are a few samples. Do you know which books these come from?
