Today was the first day of “Mama Preschool” in which I once again pretend I am qualified to home school my child (I am not). At least this time we’re not pretending to do it while we both work. We’re still afraid of sending Julius to daycare until at least Will gets the vaccine, but if he were still in daycare he’d be in preschool by now. Julius was pretty disappointed when he realized “Mama Preschool” was not the same as actual preschool. He told me multiple times “I want to go to preschool!” I felt like I’d deceived him a bit…
Through no credit of my own, Julius’ vocabulary has dramatically improved over the last year. It is really funny, he still makes up words and uses them in sentences, but when you ask him what they mean he tells you that they don’t mean anything. He still has some gems in his vocabulary though. For instance the other day he was pushing a box (imaginary firetruck) around the floor with his favorite stuffed dog Gaga inside and shouting “the smoke protector is coming!” I explained to him several times that the thing on the ceiling was a smoke detector but he would not be convinced. Oh the irony. And when he doesn’t want to go to bed he tells me “I am going to unscape!” And then when he wants you to catch him, “I am unscaping…” Adorable (and also when he’s escaping, frustrating).
Well this is the last installment of my how-to’s on Julius’ Winnie the Pooh Adventure. Today I’m going to show you how I made Owl’s Blustery House. So I have to be honest – this is far from my best work. I had grand visions of making a really cool cardboard house that looked exactly like owl’s tree house in Winnie the Pooh and the Blustery Day. Something to rival the catbus. In my dreams it had peaked roofs and everything. Unfortunately as I got closer to Patricia’s due date my dreams slowly degraded. The day before the party on the expected due date of my second child I devoted about 45 minutes to this little number. Honestly he uses it all the time so in terms of effort-to-use ratio, we’re really getting our money’s worth.
Owl’s Blustery House
Owl’s Blustery House
What you’ll need:
- Large cardboard box
- Box cutter
- a small desk fan
- cabinet knob (optional)
- acrylic paints in desired colors (ideally yellow and white and blue)
- string
- streamers
- crepe paper leaves to cover the roof (I used these in green)
- Cut double door out using the box cutter. My split door was 12″x20″ high and divided into two portions 12″x8″ on the top and 12″x12″ on the bottom.
- Cut windows in the left and right sides of the house.
- Cut small 5″x5″ square in the back of the house to insert the fan in.
- Using the box cutter, cut two 1″ slits in the bottom of the 5″x5″ square, spaced apart the length of the stand of the fan (see picture below).
- Insert fan through the back of the house into the 1″ slits, and poke a hole just above the 5″x5″ square, insert a piece of string through the hole, then through the top wire of the fan and tie. This should hold the fan securely in place.
- Paint the house as desired. I attempted to paint the front of the house to look like owl’s house in yellow with white trim, and blue window glass).
- Along the “trim” of the bottom door, poke a small hole in the door then insert cabinet knob as door knob if desired.
- Throw some crepe paper pom-poms on top of the house to look like fake leaves as if the house might be in a tree. (Mine were reused from the Totoro party).
- Finally tape some crepe paper streamers in varying lengths from the room of the house before you turn on the fan. Julius had great fun catching these and ripping them off. We attached puzzle pieces to a few of them for the Adventure.
Close up of the fan – note the tie above and the slits holding the fan base below.
Julius contemplating the house.
Julius is delighted by the windy house.
Having a great time pulling the streamers
