{kid craft} bookmarks

We haven't done any kid craft posts in a while now. Actually, there are a couple of reasons. There's things like summer and big brother going to school soon. But also it just got too much to do, photograph and post every week - and I realized I wasn't really doing this for the kids anymore. So we do some school prep instead these days, and just head out a whole lot, enjoying the time we don't have to do something while we still can.

Every once in a while we still sit down to do something though. This week big brother went to a friend's birthday party and since we bought a book as gift, we figured we'd do some of our tried-and-true bookmarks to go with it. Little brother did these as sibling gifts for Christmas, and we also made dog-themed ones as party favors.

This time, I marked a simple sheet of paper with lines every 5cm, showing big brother where the bookmarks would be cut. He then just colored using pencils and drawing all kinds of things for his best friends, carefully writing their names as well. There's the birthday boy in soccer uniform with a soccer ball, another friend with a cat and then one with his dog (no, that yellow thing is not a bee, it's Sammy the dog...). He took it very seriously.

The finished picture. With the, er, enthusiasm and frequency that my big boy likes to draw, I'm surprised you can actually see what it's supposed to be. No, make that amazed. I know, others draw the most gorgeous pictures at age almost 6, but hey, for my boy this is truly great. And I love that he took the time to pay attention to detail, think about what each of his friends would like and try his best in getting there.

Little brother on the other hand was busy being cranky. Sharpening pencils, getting in the way, whining and just being a general nuisance. Until he remembered he could take several pencils at once for coloring.

Am I the only one who thinks we have a tired little artist here?

Big brother joining the fun.

Once finished, I cut the paper into strips and laminated them, punched holes and tied on matching ribbon. Easy.

We also made some from the other drawings they did, which turned out rather cute, too.

Seems like we'll have enough bookmarks over here to last us the next few weeks...

Happy crafting,
Swenja