Conference Craft Run Down

Hey friends! 

 The stomach flu hit our house a couple of days ago and there's not a chance in the world that I get all of the blogging done that I was planning to this week. Booo. 

 I know that Gen Conf crafts take a bit of planning/buying materials, etc...so I decided to compile a list of our favs quickly here for you! 

 Here is a list of crafts that we've tried and loved - along with a Pinterest board I've saved all of the tutorials to!

  Salt Dough! 

 -We love making this at least twice a year for Conference...but it also comes out at Christmas time to make ornaments, on boring rainy days, etc. Grab some food coloring and you're off to the races with endless creative possibilities! 

Easter Egg Suncatchers!

 -We did these this week. Easy, inexpensive. Perfect quiet craft. We colored them with Sharpies (older kids), acrylic paint (stains clothing - so wear play clothes), and also did cut up tissue paper squares with Elmer's glue (older kids). Love love these. They look so pretty in our windows! 

Prayer Rocks!

 -We love doing the traditional "PRAY"-er rock style, but we've also done extras with happy, friendly words and pictures. We put them outside on our front walk. You can find river rocks on Amazon, but I've found that they're significantly cheaper if you go to a craft store like Michaels (or even the craft department at WalMart) instead of shipping them. Paint pens are easy to find on Amazon! 

Popsicle Stick Treasure Boxes!

-My kids LOVE these. You can put them together using Modge Podge or hot glue (you decide what works best for your kids' ages). You can either buy the pre-dyed rainbow sticks, or use the plain sticks and paint them afterward. We've decorated these with beads and glitter afterward, too, or lined the inside with felt. You can tie this in to Gen Conf with the scripture about storing up our treasure in heaven. 

Tin Foil Hearts! 

 -I love the scripture about Christ engraving His love for us on His palms and us engraving our love for Him on the tablets of our hearts. We did a quick chat about that during a song between talks and then handed out the hearts for our kids to decorate. We used the back of paintbrushes to etch the designs. There was a bit of a learning curve in not tearing the foil. but luckily foil is easily replaced. My kids loved writing words and drawing designs that reminded them of God's love for them and their love for God (mostly in the form of things they're grateful for and people in their lives who they love!). 

Magnets! 

 -These are always a favorite. They're a little more time-intensive and require me to be very hands-on, but it probably would be easier with fewer kids. You can either draw pictures or use pretty designed paper for these - my kids love drawing their own designs. It's so fun to make magnets for our own fridge, and make extras for Grandparents or neighbors!

Journals!

 -I've found that my kids are much more likely to take notes if they like whatever they're writing on/in! We've made Gen Conf notebooks in several different ways - usually in the day or two before conference. It's a fun craft to get them excited about taking notes! We give treats for notes...the rule is if you take three notes, you earn a candy at the end of the talk! The notes can be whatever they want - part of a story, words they heard, a picture of the speaker, etc. I've ordered notebooks from Amazon before (click here) to decorate, or we've made them out of boxes or cereal boxes (like on the Pinterest board I linked above). 

  

 **This conference I ordered these absolutely adorable and practical kid workbooks (from Work and Wonder) from Deseret Book's website. They're $15/ea. I can't even explain how awesome these are. Click here to score your own! I'll let you guys know if they make a difference in our note taking at all...**

Puppets!

-The picture I posted on my IG about this blog post shows the cutest little puppets! We ordered the kit from Amazon for $13. They're adorable, SUPER easy...my kids basically did these themselves. One kit makes eight puppets - and the possibilities for creativity are endless. You can hot glue these OR use the little glue dots that come in the kit! We ended up with lots of extra pieces left over after we made these guys - which means we could make accessories or pretend food for our puppets. Highly recommend! Link here.

Peg People!

 - My kids love painting families of peg people! This is the pack we bought on Amazon. I recommend painting these with acrylic paint (play-clothes only! they stain!), but Sharpies also work. I've found that spending a bit of time painting peg people and then doing a different craft while the first layer dries keeps my kids from getting super bored with any single craft. By the time they've wrapped up something else, their peg people are ready for final touches (googly eyes, yarn hair, etc). These peg people are pretty small, but you could spring for larger ones if you care to! This is a craft my kids have played with for months after conference!

Happy Conference crafting, friends!! xo

   

Gen Conf Sugar Cube Temples!

Hey friends!

For the last several years, I've collected (and created) some easy craft ideas that help keep my babes quiet and reverent during General Conference. I thought it might be nice to share some of them with you all as we approach the April sessions - just in case you need help containing the craziness of children during conference, too 🧡 

My kids love Conference - and my hope is that as they get older, they'll transition from excitement over treats and crafts to excitement over feeling the spirit. (I'll check in in about a decade and let you know how it works out for us...)

DISCLAIMER: I'm not a professional blogger - I'm a very busy Mom of six. You're going to have to forgive my lack of amazing professional pics here, folks. Please see my very unprofessional home video of this specific craft at the end of the post haha. You're welcome!

I'll be posting as many of our crafts as I can before conference rolls around in a couple of weeks - starting wiiiiith...::drum rolllll:::

Sugar Cube Temples

This is my kids' fav craft we do at Gen Conf time. Is it because they love engineering their very own temples because they are so very righteous? Or is it because they love having a delicious supply of sugar cubes in their bedroom room for the six months following GC when they get to build another one..? The world may never know...

In any case, they love it and it keeps them quietly entertained and engaged for at least a few talks.

Supplies needed:

-sugar cubes! (duh)  // You can get them in the baking aisle at any grocery store. I usually get each kid two boxes. You can get more or less depending on how big you feel like building them.

-glue! // I've found that Elmer's glue works the best - but BEWARE...sugar cubes dissolve if they get too wet! see below for more info... we've tried Modge Podge, hot glue, glue sticks, etc...white craft glue works best!

-a surface to build on! // We've used everything from paper plates to cardboard boxes to foam board. 

-decorations! // The first couple of years we did this, we kept it very simple with no extra decorations - just sugar cubes on paper plates. The kids love this craft so much, though, that we've gotten more and more creative with it lately - see below for more. 

Directions:

1. Plan out how large you want your temple to be. Grab your building surface and decide how many cubes you're going to use for the perimeter. For younger kids, I've found that marking a square or rectangle out on your building surface with a pencil helps them from building wonky/unstable walls. They can just follow your outline!

2. Pour glue into a bowl or onto a plate and dip! Lightly dip each sugar cube square into the glue and place it on your building surface. *LIGHTLY DIP is the key phrase here...if you submerge your entire sugar cube in glue it will slowly dissolve! Ack! We tried using paintbrushes to paint the glue on one year and it worked for a minute, but inevitably the kids got tired of it and went back to dunking. Just do whatever works for you!

3. Stack your cubes! You must hold the sugar cubes for a few seconds after you place them beside/on top of each other so they bond together - it might take a minute to find your best sugar/glue ratio for making them stick. The good news is that your learning curve will be accompanied by sticky and sweet mistakes! (...even if they get a little glue in their mouths with the sugar,  Elmer's is nontoxic, right?? haha...it's fine...) 

*My younger kids don't add a roof - they're just not coordinated enough to manage the drying times or build high enough walls. So their temples look more like forts, but it's cool. They'll be stoked if you're stoked! My older kids leave spaces for windows and doors, build steeples and separate rectangles of sugar cubes to add (after they've dried) as roofs!  

                                    For parents of super little kids, you're done! That's it!
                                         OR for parents looking to keep things simple? DONE! The end!

For everyone else:

4. Make it beautiful! As we've grown to love this craft, we've added the following to our process:

-paint: before we tried any of the other ideas listed below, we got out some paint and painted grass and flowers around our temples on the paper plates we built them on. It's a fun way to finish off the project. You could also START the project by painting the grounds, too! That would probably be even easier!

-mini landscaping: you can buy a pack of trees, bushes, flowers and rocks on Amazon. DM or comment here for the link and I'll find you the ones I buy! We stick them on using hot glue.

-modeling clay angel Moroni toppers: this part helps the craft absorb more time and adds a new tactile component. Just when my kids are getting sick of sticking sugar cubes together, it's time to bust out the modeling clay and they're reengaged in a snap.

-fake grass: I purchased a roll of fake grass last conference and I wish I had been filming their faced when I brought it out haha. They were SO EXCITED that their temples were going to look like they were actually ON temple grounds! They loved it.

-let your kids pick their fav temple and print out a picture for them to use as they build! I have dreams of doing this craft still when my kids are bigger (traditions are my favorite!), and I imagine making it competitive (timed temple building) or turning it into a guessing game (whoever can guess which temple the others made wins a prize) or whatever!