Category Archives: Crafts

DIY – Colorful Christmas candy cane

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Christmas candy cane!Alan got a school assignment, because his teacher wanted some help decorating the classroom. Each kid was asked to create a holiday candy cane, and help by the parents was allowed. After hearing about the assignment my creativity got a boost. My idea was simple but I expect it will look pretty good.

Materials

  • Wire frame: 1–2 pieces of metal wire for the cane shape
  • Filler: Aluminum foil
  • Yarn/wool: Red, white, and green
  • Tape: Masking or packing tape
  • Tools: Scissors; optional pliers for bending wire

Prep the frame (5–10 min)

  • Shape: Bend the wire into a long “J” for the candy cane.
  • Secure ends: Fold or curl the wire tips inward and tape over them. Dont leave any sharp points.
  • Test sturdiness: Gently wiggle the cane. If it flops, add a second wire along the stem.

Add volume (5–10 min)

  • Stuff: Wrap foil around the frame to make it thicker.
  • Kid job: Hold and squish the filler to shape the curve.
  • Tape wrap: Lightly tape the filler so it stays in place. Don’t over-tape; yarn will cover it.

Wrap with yarn (15–25 min)

  • Anchor start: Tie or tape the end of the red yarn at the base.
  • Spiral wrap: Wind the yarn around the cane in a spiral, keeping wraps close.
  • Stripe pattern: After a red section, switch to white, then green.
  • Cover gaps: If you see filler, add a few extra wraps over that spot.
  • Finish end: Tuck the final yarn end under a nearby wrap and add a tiny piece of tape at the back.

Alan’s Milano

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Alan's Milano!Over 2000 little pieces, two instruction manuals with over 400 pages, without any helping hand! Alan has been working days to build his newest lego set. The Milano. The spaceship used by the Guardians of the Galaxy to move around. The result was really nice, and because his room was already filled to the brim with lego sets we even got him a nice display cabinet!

Coconut insect hotel

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I continue to see new creative projects which I can realize with a simple coconut. After making a drinking cup, a cookie jar and an orchid pot I now recreated a project I already did in the past, but now with a coconut as an important part. My new project is a coco insect hotel. I made an insect hotel without any coconut in the past that is already hanging on our outside wall for a couple of years. Sometimes insects hang around, but it is not a very popular/busy object.

The ‘old’ insect hotel requires that the insects fly. Flying is the only way to arrive and that probably limits the usage that we see. The newly created coco insect hotel is created in a similar way, but I will not put it on the wall, but instead simply place it among the plants on the dirt. This way the insect hotel can serve a much greater amount of insects.

First step was cutting a cocunut in half. This is getting easier every time now that I’m getting some experience. With the coco cut open you need to remove all the white inside. I use a dull knife to cut the white ‘meat’ in small strips which are easy to remove. After drying the empty coconut I sanded the edges and that was the coco part. All done. Now I get some reed, and cut this into small pieces of around 4 cm each. I used two types of reed, new fresh green reed, and older dried up light brown reed. The fresh green reed was easier to deform, so it made it easier to fit inside the coco. Before putting the reed inside the coco I sanded it a little to take away any imperfections. I mixed sizes so that different insect could find different sizes rooms in our hotel.

I put some paper inside the back of the coco, so the reed does no go in to the coco all the way to the back. The paper fills up the back part, and after filling up the front with the pieces of reed I could align the pieces a little by pushing the a bit deeper into the paper, or by pulling them out a bit.

Coco cookies

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Coco cookies!Super easy, super tasty and super fun to make. What else could you ask for.

Ingredients:
– A package of cookies
– Condensed milk
– A package of coconut powder

Step 1: Throw all the cookies into the blender and mash them up into a fine or semi-fine powder.
Step 2: Mix the cookie powder with a part of the coconut powder and the condensed milk. Mix it all up, and then make small balls of the mix.
Step 3: Roll the balls through the coconut powder and lay them all out on a big plate. When you have all the balls place the plate in the refrigerator. After the balls have turned more firm in the fridge they are all done!

Extra (will take a lot more time preparing):
– Buy one or two coconuts to present your coconut cookies in style.

Use a saw to cut the coconut in half. Use only the part without the three marks, and try and give this part the ideal size you prefer. One of the three marks can be easily pushed in, push a hole in this mark to get all of the liquid out of the coconut. Once drained saw the coconut in half carefully. Take out the white insides with a spoon, and leave the coconut a white so it can dry. Now you need to make the inside and the edge smooth using sandpaper.
You can leave the outside a bit rougher if you like, but it will make the coconut more difficult to clean. I smoothed the top two centimeters of the outside, so it will be nice when using the coconut for drinking. In this case we will not drink from the coco; we will fill it up with the coco-balls we created. The perfect presentation.

Costs: Cheap package of cookies: 1.20, condensed milk: 2.50, coco powder: 2.00, two coconuts: 2.00. Total: 13.97.
Homemade coco-balls presented in a fantastic coco-cup: Priceless

Tide clock!

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Tide clock!I bought the mechanism for a tidal clock. Basically a regular clock, but instead of showing the hours it will indicate the time it takes to reach high tide and low tide. We love visiting the La Laja beach with low tide, so this is a perfect ‘thing’ to place on the wall. I only bought the mechanism, so I will need to make the entire clock myself. I could have bought a finished product directly, but I did not like the versions that were available. I thought I could do better myself.

A tide clock is specifically designed to track the motion of the tides, which are influenced by the Moon’s position relative to the Earth. A tide clock typically completes one cycle every 12 hours and 25 minutes, reflecting the average time between two high tides or two low tides.

  • Get the tide mechanism. Note that there is only one dial! There is only one dial needed to indicate the water is going up or going down. There is no need for a dial indicating minutes or seconds.
  • Get a regular clock. Try and find a cheap one where you can more or less easily disconnect the plastic front panel, and disconnect the clock mechanism.
  • Dismantle the regular clock. Remove the mechanism and remove the backplate. We only need the outside frame and the plastic front cover.
  • Create a new backplate, and put it in the clock. The backplate has the term ‘High tide’ on top. Then to the right a countdown to low tide. 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. At the bottom we have the text ‘Low tide’ and on the left of the backplate we have a countdown to high tide from the bottom to the top. 5, 4, 3, 2, 1.
  • Place the tide mechanism in the clock, and the tide clock is finished!

Costs: Mechanism 3.47, Clock: 8.50, Paper/decoration: 2.00. Total: 13.97.
Having a beautiful homemade tide clock on the wall: Priceless

Insect hotel

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Our birdhouse showed us we that we had set our goals way to high. Our objectives were unobtainable. Maybe it was caused by the heat, or the general lack of birds in our area. We don’t know, but it is clear that after more than half a year we haven’t seen a single bird getting near the birdhouse we placed outside of Alex’ room.
We needed to refocus to something a bit more realistic. There are lots of insects, so why not make them a home, and see if we can get some results here. An insect home should be easier to make, and insects are probably less picky compared to birds.

Step one: With a couple of pieces of wood we made the basic frame
Step two: We pained the basic frame the same color as the wall, so it will not stick out so much
Step three: We collected a couple of sticks and some bamboo, which we cut in lots of pieces of 3 centimeters
Step four: All the pieces were glued inside the frame.
Step five: Leave to dry, and hang outside.

Now we only need to be patient. Maybe some insect will find the hotel and visit it for a while. We shall see.

Big box

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Box!It arrived! A big box was delivered to my home. I am very happy because I know what is inside. Do you know? The kids will be happy for sure, even though Alan will need to be a bit patient. He is still a little small for this box. Alex will be very happy, as it fits perfectly with the small collection he already has.

My problem now? How do I get a huge box (47cm x 55cm x 40cm) with number 75192, weighing about 15 kilos safely to Spain.

Spinner

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Spinner!All the kids in Alex’ school have a spinner, except for Alex, and that situation needed to be corrected. Buying a spinner would have been the easiest, but making our own spinning toy was much more fun.

The result was something that made us both very happy. The steps to make a spinner are easy. First you need four bearings, some glue and a piece of shoelace.

First you need to take one bearing and take of the metal coverings and clean it with some soap to remove all the grease. This make the bearing spin faster. Step two is gluing the other three bearings and glue the shoelace around the entire spinner to make it a bit stronger.

In the middle we put a piece of wood, so you can also spin the spinner on the table. The easiest way is spinning it in your hands, but Alex’ hands are still a bit to small. The only issue is that after some use the glue does not always hold and the spinner needs some repairs.

Wuppie

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With Alex I made a nice wuppie. The process was relatively simple and the result is a nice soft ball for playing. Finally something different than all the ‘vechten’ (fighting) Alex wants to do all the time with his toys.

wuppie1Step 1:
Cut two cardboard circles and put them on top of eachother. Make sure both of them have a cut across from the outside to the center. You will need this cut later to easily remove the cardboard from the wuppie.
wuppie2Step 2:
This it the bulk of the work. Use a cord to cover all the cardboard, en keep adding the cord until the entire center is filled with the cord and you cannot add any more.

wuppie3Step 3:
Once you are done spinning the cord you need to cut open the wuppie from the sites. Put a sharp knife of scissors in between the twee pieces of cardboard and cut all the cords.

Step 4:
After cutting all the cords do not remove the cardboard. First add a few ropes to bind the center of the wuppie. Wrap the rope thightly though the center (in between the twee cardboards) and make a thight knot. Then remove the cardboard pieces. Your wuppie is now done. Some prefab eyes make it even better. Have fun!