It probably will not surprise you to find out that our home does quite a few "kid-centric" activities throughout the year. (You know, what with the four kids and all.) We have all the usual suspects, of course--Halloween, birthdays, Christmas, Easter--but last year we added some New Years projects to the mix. I thought I might share a couple here in case you are looking for some last minute ideas.
Now, I want to preface this by saying that these ideas aren't necessarily "pretty". These are just activities that we threw together to give the kids something to do leading up to midnight. If you are like us and have a ton of kid-crafty supplies laying around, you can probably do either one of these things without having to leave your house to go get anything. And our kids really enjoyed themselves, so it's not all bad.
Anyway! Our first activity of the night was making fireworks. This is super-easy. You need construction paper, glue, and glitter. Do I really have to tell you how to do it? No. I didn't think so. Here are the kids doing their thing:
Even Zander (3.5 at the time) was able to get in on this one. He was so impressed with being able to squeeze that glue everywhere. It was pretty funny.
Finished product! Look how proud he is! We taped these up in the entryway so that people could see them when they came by the house.
Our friends' oldest daughter did this one on her own later in the evening. I love how she took all the different materials we had on hand and make fireworks out of each thing.
This next project was our "noisemaker" project and I wasn't completely happy with how they turned out. The kids didn't seem to mind, but I'm hoping to make some improvements this year. We used old, cleaned out soda bottles, dried beans, construction paper, and anything else the kids could find on the art shelf. Fill the bottles with the beans, glue the cap on, decorate the paper, and then wrap the paper around the bottle. Bam! You are done.
Here are the kids during the process:
And here are a couple of the finished products. When we went outside to ring in the New Year, the kids took these outside and shook the tar out of them. It was a noisy, fun affair. This year I am planning to have the kids pick different items to put inside the bottles so that they don't all sound the same. I also plan to glue the paper down to the bottle better.
This year we are adding a couple projects to the list. I want to do some decorating like this. I think I'll probably go a little less pink, however. I also want the kids to make a time capsule to open next New Year's Eve. I'm still brainstorming on that one a little, but I think it will be fun. I'm stoked because we just found out that Jason will be home that night; originally he was going to be at work. So yay!
What are your plans for tomorrow? How are you planning to ring in the New Year?
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