Easter Egg Decorating

This Easter holidays I helped run a craft workshop for children with our local creative group the Neotists. The children made nests from found twigs and materials and painted and decorated Easter eggs. It was great fun and if you are at a loss for activities for your children this Easter weekend, then it is so simple, so here are some tips to give it a go!

To make the nests, we used very bendy green twigs - willow is a perfect choice. We started with three twigs arranged in six pronged 'star' and bound them in the centre with string or yarn. Then we proceeded to weave twigs, grass, straw and yarn in and out of this formation from the centre out. Now time to fill the nest.

We used polystyrene eggs, but you could just as easily use hard boiled hens eggs. Some of the younger children simply painted their eggs in bright colours, which looked fab. But we also laid out pretty floral paper napkins, leaves and foliage so some children could stick these on. If you want to play with decoupaging your eggs, simply water down some PVA glue slightly, then paint a layer of this onto your egg.

Now lay on the leaves, petals or paper napkins (make sure you take off the second, bottom layer of tissue from the napkin first to make it easier to stick down) then apply more glue over the top.

Some of the children cut out some of the motifs from the napkins first to create patterns, however you can cover the whole egg in one napkin, trimming off the excess as you go. You could also use coloured tissue paper to cut out shapes, or other decorative papers, but the thinner the paper the better as it will adhere much more easily.

This was all great fun, but if you want a slightly less messy activity this Easter, there is also always my cute knitting egg cosy pattern which you can find free here!

Happy Easter!

Cardboard City

This week, I have been helping out at the Imagine children's festival at the Royal Festival Hall, Southbank. The guys from Land of Kids have put on a pirate school and a cardboard kingdom workshop and a couple of days this week I was part of the team overseeing the children who are making the cardboard architecture in their half term. 
It all started with a stunning red routemaster, the creative genius Sarah Waites of The Bungaloo, who has been running the workshops, and has grown since there into a beautiful, imaginative, inspiring installation which all the children seem to love being part of. 
They like looking at it and spotting familiar landmarks like the London Eye, Big Ben, Tower Bridge, Wembley, London Zoo, even Willy Wonka's chocolate factory! I think it is fab that lots of children have included their own homes. They also love playing with the cardboard pieces, especially the vehicles and boats on the Thames, which I realised after resurfacing the napkin road what seemed like hundreds of times while continually rescuing sinking ships!

If you have children, get down to the Southbank this weekend and add to the city, become a pirate, colour in the walls, see shows and hear stories, all completely free! Here are some pictures from the cardboard kingdom - wish I could have taken pictures of everything.