DIY Cardboard Box Entertainment for Kids: Indoor Golf

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When Christmas is less than one week away and it’s too cold to go outside, we like to transform a cardboard box into a DIY Holiday indoor golf game. It’s totally worth it because it entertains our kids for hours.

Cardboard boxes have always been, and will always be such a versatile toy, capable of endless hours of activity and creativity.

If you feel like bringing a little golf indoors like we did, see the full tutorial we shared at Momtastic.

For those of you that look at this and see way too much work like most people, you must know…you don’t have to paint a thing or make it fancy. A plain cardboard box with small openings gets the job done. And, if the kids want to be the lead artist, let them.

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Voting Idea for Kids: DIY Ballot Voting Booth

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What an election circus it’s been this year?! We’re happy to see it end. Our ballots are in. We will be tuning in to see the results on Election Day!

Our kids have been hearing about the election from every direction. They are too young to cast their vote on Nov. 8, but with an election at school, they still feel like they are part of a voting process, at their level.

Their school ballot has really fun issues. Oh, to be a kid again where the word donut is actually on the ballot. Bravo to the creative moms that created the ballot ‘issues,’ and the idea of this mock election at school.

ELECTION BALLOT FOR KIDS

Dessert
the school will vote on the best dessert, and the there will be a party with the winning dessert served
Donut vs. Cupcake

Charity
$100 will be given to the charity chosen
Toys for Tots vs. Make a Wish

School Theme Song
the song will be played at all sporting events for the year
Can’t Stop the Feeling, Justin Timberlake vs. Hands Clap, Fitz and the Tantrums

Election week is full of activities. First, the kids will spend some time completing this sentence, “If I were President, I would…” Those papers will line the school hallways, then go home to parents, which is sure to be a priceless document to hold on to forever. Next, the kids will register to vote during lunch. Finally, on Nov. 8 the kids will cast their votes, just like America. Their voice will be heard.

Of course, the kids need a proper voting booth, so we went to work.

This is so easy, and took less than 1 hour.

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Materials:

  • Duct tape, red, white and blue
  • Large box
  • X-acto knife
  • Silhouette America electronic cutting machine

Directions:

Find a big box at your local Home Depot, or appliance center dumpster.

Line the front and back of the box with red and white strips of duct tape.

Line the sides of the box with strips of blue duct tape.

Fold over pieces of the white duct tape, and cut out stars. Use double-sided tape to stick the stars on the blue sides of the box.

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Use an X-acto knife to cut a slit in the front for kids to drop their ballots.

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Add the letter VOTE to the front of the box. We used our Silhouette America electronic cutting machine to cut the letters.

Now, get the kids to VOTE.

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DIY Halloween Tee: Witchful Thinking

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It’s wishful thinking to think that we will dress up every year on Halloween. It can be fun, but it’s not our most favorite holiday to celebrate, so we typically don’t dress up. We dress the kids cute and call it good. Our favorite part about the holiday is celebrating at our aunt and uncle’s house. The party is loud, the food is good, the homemade costumes rock and the laughter echoes throughout the house. We love a good tradition that is carried on for generations…don’t you?

If you semi-like Halloween, don’t care for it at all, or have a party to go to but don’t want to dress up, this DIY semi-costume is for you. It’s a last-minute, really easy DIY tee that can be made in less than 10 minutes. Procrastinators, you got this!

This Witchful Thinking tee is cute, and you won’t be totally lame at this year’s party with black pants and a witches hat to fancy it up a bit.

Where our witches at?

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Materials:

  • Cotton t-shirt
  • Iron-on letters
  • Iron

Directions:

Step 1: Cut out letters for WITCHFUL THINKING.

Step 2: Follow iron-on letter package instructions.

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Step 3: Wear it and have fun!

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DIY Trolls Halloween Costume

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Can’t Stop This Feeling by Justin Timberlake is a song that’s been on repeat in our home all summer. Now with the anticipation of the movie Trolls {in theaters November 4), the song is being played even louder while simultaneously having a dance party! We’re so excited about the movie. Jessica’s kids wanted to be Poppy and Branch, two characters from the movie Trolls. Today she’s telling us how she made one Poppy costume and two Branch no-sew DIY Halloween costumes.  You still have one week to make this costume before Halloween – you can do it!

Materials:

  • Felt, 23 green sheets {about .25 cents each), 1 light green sheet, 3 white sheets
  • White acrylic paint, Plaid Crafts
  • Peel-n-Stick permanent fabric fuse tape {this worked well for me, but Hello Wonderful made amazing felt costumes with a hot glue gun, so that’s an option, too}
  • khaki pants, cut like shorts
  • Turquoise sweatshirt, Wal-Mart
  • Pink pants and long sleeve shirt, Wal-Mart
  • Pink glitter boots, The Children’s Place
  • Grey long underwear, Costco
  • Troll wigs, Wal-Mart or Amazon
  • Black spray paint
  • Vests, Carters
  • Velcro
  • Faux flowers
  • Scissors {good for fabric}

Directions:

Branch Costume

Cut out felt leaves. I used a leaf cut out as my template, and then I cut, cut and cut some more.

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Add Peel-n-Stick to the back of the leaves, and begin to layer the leaves on the vest, from the bottom-up.

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Cut the khaki pants to be shorts.

Cut green felt squares and rectangles to place on shorts to look like patches.

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For Branch, I needed a black wig, but couldn’t find one, so I spray painted a purple wig black.

The grey clothes underneath not only keep the kids warm, but it’s the color of the Trolls skin. Win-win!

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Poppy Costume

Cut the sleeves off a turquoise sweatshirt. I used the Peel-n-Stick tape to ‘hem’ the cut seams.

Cut petals with white felt. I used a cut-out petal, similar to the leaf vest process. Add Peel-n-Stick to the back of the petals and add the petals to the bottom of the dress to match Poppy’s design.

Paint the bottom of Poppy’s dress to look like the real thing. I free-handed the design on the bottom.

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Use scraps from the sweatshirt sleeves to make Poppy’s headband. I used the Peel-n-Stick tape to make the headband edges more seamless.

Paint faux flowers turquoise and hot glue them to the headband. Cut small felt petals to glue behind the flowers.

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Poppy’s dress has a little wrap around the neck, so I used the hood of the sweatshirt to wrap around the neck. To keep it in place, I added a small strip of velcro to the hood and sweatshirt.

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GIMME’ MORE!
Check out all these other amazing no-sew costumes!

Fairy Costume | Design Dazzle
Bumble Bee | Sugar Bee Crafts
Cat | Paging Supermom
No Sew Ideas | Rachel Teodoro
Moana | Houseful of Homemade
Alice in Wonderland | Polka Dot Chair
Rain Cloud | Make It Love It
Dinosaur | Ginger Snap Crafts
Bubble Bath | Giggles Galore
Hades | House Wife Eclectic 

DIY Halloween Costume Contest Award

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And the best costume goes to……{insert drum roll}

The best Halloween costume award is always a big deal. The friendly competition among our kids and their peers is something they look forward to every year. The best costume, the cutest costume, the scariest costume, the funniest costume and the most original costume are awarded to kids in every grade. To properly reward them, they receive a small gift or acknowledgement. The DIY Halloween award that we are sharing today is not only affordable and adorable, but it is an edible {who doesn’t love a giant Hershey’s chocolate bar} medal that can be worn with pride, it can be customized with names and any costume category, plus it’s a favor bag so gift cards and notes can be easily inserted.

We can’t take full credit for this idea. Jessica’s friend Atlanta introduced us to this idea last year, and we loved it so much, we decided to make our own version. Thanks, girl.

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Materials:

  • Caution tape, Oriental Trading
  • Hershey’s Chocolate Bar, giant
  • Masking tape
  • Scissors
  • Double-sided tape
  • Bat cut-outs, we used our Silhouette electronic cutting machine
  • Black card stock {we used Astrobrights Papers} and gold spray paint if you want the bat to be gold
  • Chalkboard favor bag, Target $1 and $3 section
  • Chalkboard marker

Directions:

Step 1: Gather materials.

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Step 2: Use Silhouette software to design the bat, and then use the machine to cut out the bat, or use a template online. Spray paint the bottom of the bat {optional}.

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Step 3: Write the award on the envelope with a chalkboard marker.

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Step 4: Use the double-sided tape to tape the bat to the envelope {above the text}.

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Step 5: Cut the caution tape to the size you want.

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Step 6: Flip the chocolate bar face down. Line up the caution tape evenly on each side. Use masking tape to tape the caution tape to the chocolate bar. We used two strips on each bar.

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Step 7: Insert a gift card to a favorite local spot for kids {optional}. Get a panel of judges, and once all the votes have been tallied, reward the best dressed with their DIY giant chocolate bar medal.

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Note: When no one is home but kids during the day, and a project must get done, the kid becomes the photographer. These last two photos are property of Jessica’s youngest, Jackson {age 4}. He loved every second playing ‘photographer’ of the day. And, since no one is around or organized enough to have an actual costume ready, the plaid shirt totally plays off as the best lumberjack ever, right?!

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