How to make an Easter bunny gift bag {guest post}

Posted March 17, 2014 By Emma 4 Comments

Today’s guest post is from the ever so lovely Jacqueline from Zippy Zippy. Ironically, one of my very first posts was an Easter related post and Jacqueline was the very first person, apart from my mother and my sister, to comment and start following my blog! I’ll always hold a special spot for her because of that. xo Jacqueline lives in country Victoria with her husband and three gorgeous boys and they have the most amaaaaazing veggie garden that I have always been envious of and if you’re after handmade fabric bunting – head over to Jacqueline’s made-it store right now! Jacqueline is sharing with us how to make one of the most adorable little Easter gift bags I have ever seen that looks easy enough even for someone of my meagre sewing skills! Thanks Jacqueline!

How to make an Easter bunny gift bag

I found a tutorial on how to make

this sweet little Easter Gift Bag and another beautiful sample here

and had the urge to make one.

I printed off the template, and as I was cutting it out,

thought I might try making it out of brown paper

rather than the denim I had in mind.

So here is my paper version.

(The original in the above link on Merrilee’s Blog is made of felt)

Trace the template onto a double thickness of brown paper,

but do not cut it out.

Sew along the traced line, stitching both pieces of paper together,

but do not sew between the ears,

this is where you will put the goodies in.

Trim around the edge of the stitching – about 1/4 inch.

You can see from this pic,

you could also just use a paper bag and cut out the ears at the top.

Add some fabric onto the ears,

I used heat ‘n’ bond to adhere the fabric to the paper,

or you could use pretty paper or washi tape

Find some treasure to put inside,

pop them in through the opening between the ears.

Flex the ears, so the curve towards the front,

gather up the paper and tie with some pretty twine.

This project was easy and nice and quick,

the gift bag would also look great

made from coloured paper or baking paper.

Have a great Easter

Jacqueline

This post is part of the Frog Goose and Bear Easter craft series. If you’d like to submit an Easter craft, recipe or activity to share here on Frog Goose and Bear, please email me! To see the other posts in this series, click here.

Easter Craft: how to make a clucking chicken

Posted March 14, 2014 By Emma 2 Comments

This post was published back in 2011 (excuse the terrible photography) but it is still visited very often on this site and as chickens are particularly popular at Easter time, I thought I’d include it in our current series of all things Easter…

http://froggooseandbear.blogspot.com.au/search/label/easter%20series%202014

This plastic cup looks and sounds just like a chicken! It really does. The sound is much more accurate than the looks if we’re being honest…

INSTRUCTIONS:

1. Take one disposable plastic or polystyrene cup and poke a small hole in the bottom.

2. Tie a large knot in a piece of nylon string and thread it through the hole, leaving the knot on the outside so that the string won’t go through when it’s tugged on.

3. Decorate your cup so that it somewhat resembles a chicken. Stick on some feathers and some paper cut as eyes & beak or just drawing on with textas will do the trick.

4. Cut a small rectangular piece of kitchen sponge. You might like to tie it on the end of your piece of string so you don’t lose it.

5. To make the chicken cluck: slightly dampen the sponge, fold the sponge over the string (at the top) and run the sponge down the string holding it firmly with quick, short tugs and it makes a loud clucking sound.

N.B. the string really needs to be polyester (the shiny stuff) or the noise won’t be as effective (or it just plain won’t work!)

Do you have any fun craft activities of the chicken and egg variety? You might like to join in the #getyourcrafton challenge over at Me and My Shadow or certainly head over for ideas if you don’t!

For more Easter related crafts, activities or recipes you might like to follow the current FGB Easter series. You can be notified of a new post via email if you join our mailing list over there on the right or follow along on facebook or instagram.

Have you started eating hot cross buns and getting into the Easter spirit yet or am I killing you by starting you thinking about Easter far too early??

http://froggooseandbear.blogspot.com.au/p/kids-craft.html

For more kids craft ideas, check out the FGB Kids Craft page here.

How to make an Easter egg garland {guest post}

Posted March 12, 2014 By Emma 1 Comment

This gorgeously simple craft today is from the lovely Brenda from 13acres. Brenda was one of the very first bloggers I got to know when I first started blogging four years ago and we have remained friends ever since! You can see the last guest post that she shared here. Brenda is a clever creative soul and beautiful inside and out. She and her family have recently embarked on a wonderful tree change and have just moved into their newly built farm house in country Victoria where she bakes delicious goodies, takes beautiful photos, grows her own veggies and even makes her own passata. Whenever I visit her blog it always makes me smile. I know you’d love it too.

What you need

coloured paper or old wrapping paper or old cards (anything really)
scissors
something to pierce little holes (baby hole punch or sharp knife)
twine or jute string

1. Make a template of an egg shape with a piece of cardboard.

2. Use this to cut out egg shapes from your selection of paper.

We used some old scrapbooking paper and old paper bunting cards that I used to make for markets.

The bright colours were perfect for this Egg themed garland!

3. Make two small holes at the narrower end of the egg as this is where you will thread the twine.

4. Starting from the back, thread the twine in one hole and back through the other as this is how it will stay straight.

Leave enough twine on either end for hanging and hey presto, your done! An Easter Egg garland!

This post is part of the Easter craft series here on the blog. If you’d like to see more Easter crafts, activities or recipes from this series, click on the image below …

If you’d like to submit a guest post, please email me. xo

Easter Craft: How to make eggshell candles

Posted March 7, 2014 By Emma 10 Comments

Last year, I discovered the art of candle making. Who knew it was so easy?! I am now addicted and looking for any container I can get my hands on to fill with melted wax and transform into a candle. Old jars, fancy tea cups and even eggshells. Nothing is safe from being filled with melted wax!

If you’d like to give eggshell candles a crack (pardon the pun), here’s how:

You will need:

- eggshells
- food dye
- vinegar
- paper towel
- egg carton
- soy candle wax
- candle wick with metal tab
- hot glue gun
- wooden skewers

1. Clean your eggshells in some soapy water and rinse.

2. Place a few drops of food dye into a bowl of vinegar. One bowl for each colour.

3. Place your eggshells in the dye bath and roll them through the dye for about 30 seconds. Keep the eggshell in the dye for longer if you want a stronger colour. You can use a spoon if you don’t want to colour your fingers.

4. Dry your coloured eggshells on some paper towel.

5. Place dried eggshells into an egg carton.

6. Cut a piece of wick to 10cm in length and thread it through your metal tab.

7. Secure the metal tab & wick to the bottom of eggshell using a hot glue gun.

8. Tie the pieces of wick to a wooden skewer to keep the wick out of the wax.

9. Place your soy candle wax into a pyrex jug (or a double boiler saucepan).

10. Place jug in boiling water on stove and wait until it melts. It will become clear when it’s ready. Take it off the heat as soon as it has melted.

11. Pour the melted wax into the eggshells as carefully as possible.

12. Leave your eggshells to dry for a few hours and once the wax is hard you can remove the wooden skewers and trim the wick.

13. Place your new candles in some ceramic eggcups or make your own candle holders.

14. Light your candles!

My eggshell candles are now sitting on my kitchen windowsill alongside my eggshell succulents, but they’d make a great outdoor table centrepiece on a summer evening and you could even add some insect repellent essential oils!

If you wanted to shake it up a little you could:

- Add scent to your wax.

- Melt down an old candle or old crayons to add colour to your wax.

- Secure a birthday candle in the middle of the eggshell instead of a wick.

- Just skip the whole coloured bit and use plain eggshells. Very stylish.

What would you make into a candle? What is your favourite candle scent?

This post is part of a series on Easter crafts, recipes and activities here on Frog, Goose and Bear. You can click here to see all of the other posts in the series. Even better, if you’d like to do a guest post for this series, I’d love to hear from you!

* I purchased my candle supplies from Spotlight, but I’m sure you’d be able to find them at your local craft supply store.

* This post was originally published on Kidspot Village Voices in 16 Nov 2012.

Make your own Hot Chocolate this Easter

Posted March 4, 2014 By Emma 10 Comments

Continuing with our series on Easter, here is an adaptation of a post I wrote two years ago about the Cocoa-in-a-jar gifts that we made as Easter gifts. So yummy! They’re not really just for Easter though. I’ve made them a number of times since as Christmas or birthday gifts as they are a great little gift for any time of year and so very simple to make!

You can find the recipes to make your own mocha, peppermint, mexican or classic cocoa over here. I halved the recipes to fit in these jars which are roughly 375ml. Each of these particular cocoa blends are really, really delicious, but the beauty of these is that you can play around with the recipes to make your own perfect blend. It’s a great activity for the kids to be involved in as well.

When we made our Christmas cocoa mix we filled the jar to the very top, making it tricky to combine the contents in order to make the hot chocolate. The contents had to be emptied into a bowl, combined and then returned to the jar. This time, I didn’t fill the jars as high so the ingredients could be combined by simply shaking the jar.

As chocolate is such a big part of the easter tradition, I thought maybe it could be fun to gift some Easter hot chocolate!

We go camping every Easter holidays with my extended family. It is one of our favourite times of year and the kids have such a wonderful time getting dirty and finding their own fun in the Australian bush.

This is the perfect camping drink as it doesn’t require milk. Cozy cup of hot cocoa by the fire in the evenings. Can’t wait!

We love making things in jars here at FGB.

If you do too, you might like to check these out:

I actually think I may have a pathological problem when it comes to jars. I can’t throw them out. There are those who think I am rather strange, but you just never know when a jar might come in handy! Do you have a cupboard full of empty jars? Boxes full in the garage? Please tell me I’m not the only one….

I even found a post with 40 DIY Easter gifts in a jar if you’re interested!

For all of the other Easter related crafts, recipes and activities in this series, click here. If you’d like to share an Easter craft with the lovely FGB readers, I’d love you to do a guest post (email me if you do!).

An Easter craft: How to make an eggshell succulent garden

Posted February 28, 2014 By Emma 6 Comments

Usually when we eat boiled eggs for dinner (a regular easy meal at our house) the kids like to turn the egg over when they’ve finished and pretend there is a new egg to eat. The unsuspecting recipient then gets a bit of a surprise when the spoon goes right through an empty egg shell. They think it is hilarious and the joke somehow never fails to get old. However, this time I asked the kids to keep their shells intact as I had a different plan for the eggshells…

Taking inspiration from around the web we made our own little mini eggshell succulent garden.

To make your own you will need:

- egg shells

- egg carton

- succulent cuttings

- soil or potting mix

How to:

1. Give your eggshells a quick clean (I just rinsed mine under the tap), let them dry and pop them into the egg carton so your egg shells remain upright. If you don’t have an egg carton on hand, an eggcup or cardboard tube cut to size would also do the job.

2. Fill your egg shells with soil until they’re about 3/4 full.

3. Insert your succulent cuttings into the soil. Succulents are one of those amazing plants where the roots just grow when a cutting is placed into soil.

4. Gently give your new creations a light spray of water using a spray bottle. You will only need to spray your succulents every now and then as they do not like being too wet.

The eggshell succulents look pretty cool displayed in the egg carton and would also look stylish in ceramic egg cups. We made our own egg cups by cutting a toilet roll into three and gluing on some origami paper. I have a bit of a thing for origami paper, but you could use paint, fabric, wool or lace to decorate if you felt so inclined. They are now proudly displayed on our window sill above the kitchen sink.

I was lucky enough to have a good friend who grows a great variety of succulents who gave me lots of small cuttings to play with, but if you can’t find any in a backyard near you, you will have no trouble finding them at your local nursery.

Have you ever planted anything in an eggshell?

You might like to try our mini Easter terrariums in a plastic egg too …

I am currently running a series on Easter crafts here on the blog, so if you have an Easter craft you’d like to share in a guest post on Frog Goose and Bear – shoot me an email coz I’d LOVE to hear from you!

*This post was originally published on Kidspot Village Voices on 6 October 2012.

An Easter craft & ten things you can do with plastic eggs.

Posted February 25, 2014 By Emma 7 Comments

OK, so it’s a little early to be thinking about Easter. Way too early for me, as I thrive on the last minute rush. Well, maybe thrive is not quite the right word, but last minute is often the way we roll around here. I’ve been writing a couple of Easter craft tutorials for Kidspot and so I’ve got into the Easter frame of mind a little earlier than usual.

This year, here in Victoria, Easter is at the end of the school holidays which gives us a good couple of weeks of school holiday time to get into some Easter themed crafting with the kids. For the next six weeks I’m going to be posting lots of Easter craft ideas. This might also include some re-posting of a few from the FGB archives for all of my lovely new followers who might have missed them. If you have a gorgeous Easter craft to share, I’d love to include some guest posts.

I found these adorable clear plastic eggs at my new favourite, locally based, packaging supply store, Pack-it-in. We made these Easter egg terrariums using fake moss and flowers, some foam eggs (purchased here) and made the nest using florist wire.

The possibilities of what you could put inside these as Easter gifts is endless! I particularly like that they lend themselves to non-chocolatey goodies. I can imagine colourful confetti, balloons and mini streamers just for a colourful explosion of fun, filled with mini toys or a little game or activity like those we put in our bon-bons. I actually found a list here of 40 non-candy items that fit inside a plastic egg.

I couldn’t resist including the photo above. Little Miss Frog was feeling a little ignored as I was taking photos in the courtyard and it took me a while (observant parent that I am) to notice the cheeky faces she was pulling in the background.

Here are ten cool ideas that I have come across in blog land using plastic eggs as the base for some awesome crafts and activities for both kids and adults:

Have you started thinking about Easter yet?

Have you got any awesome Easter craft ideas? I’d love to share them with FGB readers, so shoot me an email and we can organise a guest post! You don’t have to have a blog to do this either.

If you’re looking for more Easter craft ideas,
you might like to head to the FGB kids craft page.

http://www.froggooseandbear.blogspot.com.au/p/kids-craft.html

A Baking Birthday Party

Posted February 4, 2014 By Emma 13 Comments

Last week Goose invited four of her favourite friends to come over to help her celebrate her tenth birthday with a baking party. They had lots of fun baking and decorating and making a big mess in our kitchen!
Here is a little run down of what we did …

1. Decorated Chef’s hats.

I picked up these cute little hats at a garage sale during the year and the girls decorated them with fabric markers.

2. Made shortbread cookies.

Using this fail-safe recipe I pre-made the shortbread and the girls just rolled and cut into shape with the plethora of cookie cutters we seem to have collected over the years.

My best ever and most faithful party helper – my Mum – couldn’t do it without her!

3. Melted chocolate.

We dipped everything into that chocolate!

Strawberries dipped in chocolate. They were lucky to make it to the tray!

Our favourite chocolate dipped grissini wands.

Chocolate dipped Oreo pops.

Chocolate alphabet moulds.

(which I totally forgot to get out of the fridge!)

4. Decorated cupcakes

Goose and I pre-made the cupcakes and gave the girls a bag of white icing and a multitude of coloured sprinkles of varied shapes and sizes to decorate their cupcakes. They got to keep their first one to take home in a special cake box and the rest went on the dessert table for later.

For something different we baked the cupcakes with edible confetti* inside!

Decorate the birthday cake!!!

Just like the cupcakes Goose and I baked this the day before the party and added sprinkles to it, but we used the regular hundreds and thousands for the cake which, although was fun, did not have quite the same awesome confetti affect as the cupcakes.

I was all prepared to have to bite my tongue and turn a blind eye to an icing and sprinkle explosion all over the cake when five ten year olds were let loose on it, but I was pleasantly surprised!

They were each given an icing bag containing a different colour and they all squeezed their colour onto the cake while I quickly smoothed it out with a knife, which created a mixed colour affect which was pretty cool and a blank canvas for them to decorate. The girls, then worked together as a team to design the rest. I was quite impressed with their result.

The sides of the cake were covered in popping candy which kept exploding at various intervals throughout the day much to the delight of the girls.

I had an area already set up for them to display their delicious goodies where they were on display until after dinner.

The gorgeous bakers. Although there were only five of them – the sugar, colouring and party high they were on certainly made a LOT of noise!

Then when Goose’s 2 younger siblings, 4 younger cousins, 3 aunts, 3 uncles and her other Grandma arrived we made pizzas

and played party games …

Pin the cherry on the cupcake

(made by the birthday girl)

Pass the parcel

The flour game

Click on the link above for details of how to play.

This game was such a hit that all they wanted to do was stick their face in the flour. Usually when we play it, they all want to avoid it, but possibly the excess of food colouring and sugar went to their heads this time

To finish it off, we ate cake !!!

(and all of the other delicious goodies the girls had made)

Drinks

water bottles (something had to counteract the sugar!) and lemon cordial.

The girls also tried dipping these glass bottles (below) in chocolate – you can see them at the bottom right in some of the dessert table pics above.

After the extended family left, Goose’s four lovely friends stayed for a sleepover where they painted their nails, watched a movie and stayed up all night talking!

As the party guests left, depending on age, they were given

‘Cookies in a jar‘, a cookie cutter and a party bag** as well as a cupcake they had decorated, the shortbread they had made and their chef’s hat.

I quite like this party format that we have going for Goose now that she is older. We did the same thing last year. A small number of friends for a few hours while her younger siblings go to their cousins for a play and then extended family (and siblings return) come over for dinner which includes birthday cake and party games (so the younger siblings & cousins don’t think they’ve missed out on the party) and then the friends stay for a sleepover (which for Goose is apparently not negotiable). Helps having your birthday during the summer holidays! It probably sounds like a loooooong party, but we made sure dinner was simple and mostly pre-prepared and in this case – the girls spent their time together actually making most of the party food!! I think we’ll be using the same format again as it saves having two separate parties to accommodate friends and family and allows Goose some time with just her friends her own age.

Pics of the invites that we made for this party can be found here.

To see more of Goose’s (and her siblings) birthday parties

you can click on the drawing of the cake below …

http://www.froggooseandbear.blogspot.com.au/p/party-ideas.html

* purchased at Spotlight.
** The party bag was small and simply contained some lollies, cupcake stickers and some cupcake shaped lipgloss.

The beginnings of a baking party …

Posted January 23, 2014 By Emma 3 Comments

Just some quick snaps taken on my iphone of the invitations that Goose and I made for her baking party this weekend.

If you’d like to give them a try for your own baking party, we just printed the invitation onto some card and sewed baking paper onto the front using pink thread and a zig zag stitch.

Before you sew up the fourth side, you slide in a teaspoonful of edible sprinkles (slightly tricky!) and push them as far down as you can so that you don’t sew over them. Then you sew up the final side.

Trim the sides of the baking paper so that it is the same as the card underneath and you’re done!

We also made very simple envelopes for our invitations before we popped them in the post. We did this for a bit of fun, but also because our invitations didn’t fit into the envelopes that we had on hand. I found these A4 sheets of cupcake paper at ALDI a few months ago and knew it would be perfect for this party. A bit of washi tape with a rainbow sprinkle pattern made it even more fun.

Goose has made some garlands using cupcake wrappers, straws and doilies and we’ll be spending the day baking and preparing on Saturday before the party.

Have you ever had a baking party?

Stay tuned for party pics next week!

Collecting ideas for baking party on pinterest here

For more Frog Goose and Bear parties head over here …

An ‘Around the World’ themed birthday party

Posted January 19, 2014 By Emma 10 Comments

Last week, at the beginning of Melbourne’s heatwave, I helped a friend organise a fun party for her daughter’s fifth birthday. As a well travelled little girl with parent’s who travel often and extended family and friends living all over the world she chose the perfect theme! She also desperately wanted to wear her new traditional South Korean costume that her Mum had brought back from a recent trip overseas. All the children arrived in costumes from all over the world. Adorable.

As the day was over forty degrees celcius (that’s over 104 degrees faranheit) and the party was at 10.30 in the morning, the food was simple with nothing that required the oven being turned on!

Along with some cupcakes with flags of the world toothpicks and aeroplane shaped fairy bread, there was food that represented each continent of the world:

Asia – sushi platter , fruit in ceramic spoons (pictured above)

Europe – cheese platter

North America – Oreo cookies

South America – corn chips and guacamole & popcorn

Australia – vegemite sandwiches

Africa – bread and dips

Antarctica – drinks station with lots and lots of ice!

When the children entered the house they were each given their own passport in which they had to write their own name and draw a picture of themselves. The birthday girl’s Dad did a superb job of making the passports by photocopying his own passport, blocking out some details and then stapling the pages together.

The party guests were also given their own travel bag to collect all their goodies that they would make and collect throughout the party.

Around the house, there were seven activity stations set up. Each one representing a different continent. When the children travelled to each table (aka continent) they could complete the activity and receive a stamp in their passport.

The children decorated paper fans in Asia …

Made their own Guatemalan worry dolls in South America…

(Big thanks to Steph for this timely idea!)

Made American Indian head dresses in North America …

Threaded wooden bead bracelets in Africa …

Coloured in Babushka doll pictures in Europe

Had their face or hands dot painted in Aboriginal style in Australia along with an Australian flag tattoo …

And splashed their feet in ice and water in Antarctica!

There were also ice slushies and the drinks station in this area.

As well as these fun activities there was also a giant globe pinata

a Japanese game of giant Mikado (aka pick up sticks) as well as a paper plane making station, a dress up station with costumes from all over the world and a book reading corner with a selection of books from all over the world.

My kids had such a great time collecting stamps from each of the continents and doing the activities. This has now become one of my all time fave party themes! There is just so much scope to be creative and to change things to suit the weather, your child’s age or interests and whatever props you happen to have on hand. Such an educational theme as well!

If you’re looking for more party ideas, you might like to check out some

Frog Goose and Bear parties over here …

http://froggooseandbear.blogspot.com.au/p/party-ideas.html