Party Paperminties

 

Paperminties is proud to announce its newest product offering  to help you with your party needs - “party paperminties!”

Party paperminties are cut-paper party decorations which include:

1. Large Wall and/or entryway Décor
2. Birthday Poster/Banner with the celebrant’s name
3. Table Centerpiece Sticks
4. Table Confetti 

Large Wall Decor

Large Wall Decor

Large Wall Decor

Birthday Poster/Banner

Large Wall Decor with Birthday Banner

Table Centerpiece Sticks

Table Centerpiece Sticks

 

Table confetti

Paperminties’ first party is Miguel’s fifth “Snakes” themed birthday! 

Miguel only wanted orange, yellow and green snakes as party décor!  So glad he was pleased with the results!

Here are some photos of his fun, slithery “Snakes” party.

 

Big, big thanks for asking paperminties to do your cut-paper party decor, Miguel!

With four more parties underway, paperminties is really excited to feature more party paperminties in upcoming posts!  Do watch out for them in the next few weeks!

If you need us to customize your next party with cut-paper party decor, just let us know by sending us a private message through our Facebook page - www.facebook.com/paperminties. ; )

Homemade Montessori - Cards and Counters

This is one of the simpler Montessori DIYs I've made. I made this about a year ago.  Like the Felt Moveable Alphabet, this was to supplement my daughter's lessons at school.

When I first encountered this Montessori manipulative, I remembered how we were first taught 'numbers and counting' in the traditional school I attended back in the day - learning mostly from textbooks and hardly working on anything concrete or tangible (which would have made me learn faster and more effectively). I have since appreciated how this material is tactile, that it not only helps children recognize numbers, their sequencing and their corresponding quantities but it also introduces "odd" and "even" numbers.

These are the Montessori numbers and counters we use at the preschool where I used to work.  Photo courtesy of absorbentminds.co.uk

I have been on the lookout for shops selling Montessori materials, keeping an eye out for the red 'numbers and counters,' but haven't encountered any so I decided to make my own.

These are the materials I sourced for this project:
1. Blank flash cards - a supermarket find.  You may also use index cards.
2. Green marker- to match the glass stones.
3. Green glass stones which have flat undersides - I found these in Divisoria.  (I saw some glass stones in SM but the undersides were not flat).  Other DIY moms have used bottle caps, acorns, pine cones and even Teddy Grahams!  So you can be creative! 
4. Plastic container for the glass stones.


I use the cards for practicing sequencing.

And the number cards and counters (glass stones) for learning corresponding number quantities.

For the cards, I just wrote the numbers on the cards and drew uneven circles to resemble the glass stones.

It is important to put the exact number of counters or in this case, glass stones for numbers 1 to 10 (55 pieces) to serve as a self-check or control of error.

At times, my daughter would rather count the glass stones without the cards which also makes for good counting practice so I don't mind.

Other times, the glass stones are used for "cooking" in the Homemade Toy Kitchen (along with beans and shells) or used as "treasure" so we are almost out on glass stones.  Haha!  Time to replenish.

If you want to learn more about using this material, this post is a step-by-step tutorial on how to best use it.  You may also check out  this post to see how Lisa Nolan, a Montessori mom, uses this material with her child.

Painting Tissue Roll Owls

The hoarder in me started collecting tissue paper rolls months back for crafts with the little ones or a DIY project for the home.  It wasn't till today that painting them tickled our fancy!

I saw these cute tissue roll owls on pinterest  and thought it best to get messy and paint the tissue rolls instead (I later found out that one of the little ones had already done something similar during summer school!  Oh well! :)).

So what started out looking like this:

...was transformed into this for some crayon-resist art.

My daughter wanted to prepare some herself too for the cousins.

Then we moved outdoors for some messy painting fun!

These are some "BEFORE" shots.

I only put primary paint colors so they practice making secondary colors in the process.  I love it when they say, "Look, I made green!" or "Look, I made purple!"

And some "AFTER" shots.

!!!

 Some action shots while they were hard at work.

Quite fun so I painted some tissue roll owls myself!

Here are some of our tissue roll owls ( I think we painted nine it total).

I painted the first two.  Didn't the little ones do a better job?!

This is another easy peasy, fun craft activity that every kid (and kid-at-heart) will enjoy!

Try it yourself! = )

Reusing an Old Tin

I stumbled upon this old watch case and didn't have the heart to throw it away.

It has a nice, foam center with a circular slot where the watch (that I lost) used to be.

Remembering how crayons roll off the table when my daughter colors and sketches, I decided to reuse this old, squarish tin as a crayon holder.

Now my daughter knows to return the crayons into this holder to prevent them from rolling off the table.

It's a nice, simple way of making life easier and more organized by reusing old household items.

What about you?  What's your "reuse," "recycle" story?

My First Handmade Stamps

I'm so happy!!!  I made my first homemade, handmade stamps!!!

The story behind these handmade stamps...

Last week, I made these notecards...

Pretty.  But I was already dreaming of having my own stamps made so I could use them on note cards and really call them my own.

Then I remembered that our friend Carla had mentioned that she made her own stamps.  Making my own stamps never occurred to me before. Out of curiosity, I researched online.  Thanks to pinterest and google, I found this blog post and this blog post.  The stamp-making video and eraser stamp tutorial were really helpful.  Both posts seemed easy to follow.  I got so excited and when I got the chance to go to the bookstore, I got myself the essential tools.

Today, I finally got to play with my new toys!  This is my first stamp:

A peppermint!  Peppermints are on my paperminties banners, if you hadn't noticed! ; )

 ...and it looked like this on paper.

My daughter watched me make my first stamp and she enjoyed trying it out as well.

Then, I got really excited and ended up making more.

They were really easy to make and quite addicting!  I'm glad I bought many erasers so I could make more.  I am seriously hooked.

I was not satisfied with the colors of the store-bought stamp pads so I followed the instructions on this post to make my own. 

Homemade Ink Pads

Now, I can make note cards with designs that really have my stamp on them.  Pun intended.

I will definitely post to show photos of the note cards when I've finally made some out of these handmade, homemade stamps!