Around the World on the Wall

I am a little obsessed with world maps at the moment, and i would love to have a framed one for the kids to look at and hopefully gain a better knowledge of geography than I have. Some of my favourite finds:

Map of the World by Alex Latimer

Fine Little Day, French illustrator Steffie Broccoli poster "Fine Little World"

Personalised World Map by the lovely Janette of My Sweet Prints

World Paper Wallpaper via Wallpapered.com

I think the first one by Alex Latimer could be the one for me as I think the animals might pique the interest of the kiddlets. What do you think?

Yes please thank you - Rock Art

How amazing is this rock art

 For more photos of this beautiful work by Waii Waii - check out the flikr stream here

Quick Personalised Wrapping Paper

Looking for a quick finishing touch to grandma's mother's day present. Easy - just grab some brown craft paper, some of your childs artwork and some bakers twine and voila. Or if your paper is large enough, or present small enough, you can skip the craft paper and just wrap in the artwork. And why not make a matching card while you are at it.

To Heat or Not To Heat

Image via Purl Soho

With soaring electricity bills now a fact of life I have become one of those people who sits with a hot water bottle on my lap on the couch and a scarf around my neck before I turn on the heater. Have you become one of those people too? But I have questioned my penny pinching when it came to heating the kids room. For whatever reason I intially thought the kids rooms needed to be nice and toasty all night and so we used to have the oil heater on low all night long in my son's room. But then we received a bill (!) and had to re-think. So next we put the oil heater on a timer so that it was toasty when he went to bed, then switched itself one and off a few times during the night to reheat the room. When the next electricity bill came around - it was manageable. But with two kids rooms to now heat I have had to re-eveulate my way of thinking for fear of the next bill. So now I am going down the flannel sheets, lots of blankets and toasty PJ's route and only heating the room for 30 mins before bed time to get it nice and toasty. As long as the kids don't get colds or wake up at 3/4 am (apparently the coldest part of the night) I think this is the way we will go. What do you do at your house and for your kids? (on a side note our bedroom is like a freezer at night as I like fresh air so the window is open and my hubbie can't sleep without a fan on!)

Pottery Week 2 - Coil Pots

Last night i had my second of 9 pottery classes and this week it was Coil Pots. It is a pretty simple concept - all you need is a slab base, then you make long coils and wind your way round, joining them as you go. You can go up, in and out - but I was not quite that adventurous. I think my final product is reminiscent of Pooh Bears Honey Pot. I wasn't quite feeling this way of working with clay but apparently it can be used to form the most amazing shapped pots both super small and super huge.

No idea what i am going to use it for as it is a wierd size. Too big for small objects and too small for big objects. Any suggestions? Next week is glazing - bring on the pretty colours.

On a side note, we were talking in the class about what other classes we would like to see offered. My suggestion was a sewing class for children's clothing. What classes would you like to see your local community centre offer?

To Sleep Or To Play - Tough Call for a Two Year Old

Last month on facebook I posted this:

"Question for all those with kids- once they were in beds they could get out of how did you get them to sleep and not play at nap/ bed time? He is doing my head in!!!"

Well the good news is (touch wood) - we appear to be back to normal and he is usually asleep within 20 minutues of us saying good night. How did we manage this I here you asking? Two things:

1. We went on holidays. Not sure if the change in environment actually made a difference, but the first night we were away (at my parents farm) he went to bed like a dream.

2. Removed all the toys from his room with the exception of the ones he sleeps with. Now that sounds like mean mummy tactics - but he does sleep with a woody doll, buzz doll, soft Lighting McQueen, soft Mater, frog cuddly blanket, and also about 6 hard Cars toys, plus 2 torches, and a Percy torch - so the child is not really without toys, it is just that now he does not have every single toy he owns which inevitable ended up dumped on the floor. Only down side of this is that the lovely ikea shelf / storage set I bought less than 2 months ago now looks like this,

  and the playroom looks like this.

Hopefully as he "matures" we will be able to introduce the toys back into this room

Interestingly enough, just as he got back to normal, I read this article by A Mom with a Lesson Plan (via Modern Parents Messy Kids) about letting your kids decide when they want to go to bed. This is essentially what we have done. We do the nighttime routine of dinner, bath, story and then say good night, but let him play for as long as he wants and he eventally goes to sleep like a dream (touch wood!). I now also do the same for his bed time nap. Sometimes he will end up just playing in his room for 2 hours, othertimes he will have a 2 1/2 hour plus nap. And i have stopped going in every 10 minutes telling him to go to sleep which just ended up annoying the both of us.
Have you got any tips you can share on more peaceful bedtimes? If you want to read about some other bedtime / night time antics by little ones - head over to Amanda's Homely One blog for a bit of a giggle (sorry Amanda!) and to offer her some advice

The Ultimate Hostess Gift - Little of This, Little of That

I am thinking you could combine this

Image and details from Sinnen Rausch)

with this

Image via Laura Parke

to make the ultimate hostess gift. And if you added a little something in the inside bottom of the mug like this

Image and work by Mrs Petterson Pottery (found via Mon Carnet)

 it would be that extra special surprise when the herbs are all gone and they use the mug for tea!

A New Craft to Tackle - Pottery

Last night I had my first pottery classs. The last time I did pottery i was about 8 years old, but it was amazing how quickly it all comes back to you - the cutting of the clay with fishing wire and buttons, making pinch pots.... It is quite a soothing craft and it was nice to be able to pack up at the end of the night, walk out the door and know I will be back next week. So - my efforts for week one.....

A mask

Boob pinch pot (i didn't intentially make a boob - it just turned out that way)

I will do my best to show you what i come up with each week for the next 9 weeks. Have you ever tried your hand at pottery? I can't wait to get to the wheel work in week 3.