Saturday: Shop!–Handmade Christmas Project #3

November 1st, 2008 in Saturday: Shopping!, Books/Reading, Crafts, Children's Books

Now this was a hard project for me to mess up! So simple. And I just cut out all of the pieces late at night when Tyler and I are relaxing watch TV.

I originally saw this idea on The Artful Parent and thought this would be the perfect Christmas gift for my two girls. This way they could have their own large felt board complete with different packets of cut out images that go along with different stories and landscapes.

It is quite a simple project and is very do-able (which is perfect for me). First, I purchased a scrap of plywood about 1/4 inch thick and 2 feet by 2 feet. You will also need to pick up a can of Elmer’s Spray Adhesive, a large piece of felt a little larger than your piece of wood (for the backdrop), craft glue and many different colors of felt.

Follow the instructions on the back of your Spray Adhesive can to attach the backdrop felt to the wood. I chose a light blue color with the idea that it could be used as both the sky and the ocean. Fold the corners on the back and glue them down with the craft glue and you are already done completing the felt board!

For my images, I cut out images for each season of the year to put in packets to include with the board:

For Winter a pine tree with ornaments, a large star, snowflakes, snow to put on the ground and presents to put under the tree.
For Spring a large sun, clouds, grass to put on the bottom, stems for the flowers and quite a few flower cut outs so they can put together their own flowers.
For Summer I cut out a large tree and leaves in many different shades of green. I also cut out a large tire swing, sandbox and small swimming pool.
For Fall I cut out leaves in gold, yellow, orange and red along with a pile of leaves to place at the bottom.

No need to put anything on the back of your cutouts, felt will stick to felt and attach just fine onto the board.

I also “tried” to cut out our family and two dogs to use in all the different seasons, I hope to get around to cutting out and designing some extended family and friends. My favorite part has been recreating their favorite stories into felt board pieces. The one pictured here is The Chocolate Chip Ghost story which is a favorite in our house.