DIY Ant Farm

I'm so super excited to share this project with you. ANT FARMS are fun to make and fascinating to observe with your little ones! L and I have been staring at our jar all day, reading kids books on insects, watching some National Geographic clips on ants, and we've found some fun facts along the way. Within the first 24 hrs of placing your ants inside your DIY ANT FARM, they will dig tunnels and make chambers right before your eyes! 

The ants you collect will most likely be "worker ants" and all worker ants are female...pretty amazing! Most ant colonies contain one queen ant who lays all the eggs, male ants whose only job is to make babies with the queen, and worker ants who gather food, dig tunnels, and protect the colony. When collecting ants you want to be sure to only collect ants from one colony, otherwise the ants will fight to their death inside your jar. 

Materials needed:

-large jar (pickle jar)

-small jar (jam jar or spice jar)

-loose, sandy soil (Cactus/Citrus Soil works great!)

-spoon

-small jar or cup

-jam or sugar water

To make your ant farm, place the small jar upside down, inside the larger jar. 

Next, carefully spoon the soil into the jar. L would place a spoonful on the top of the little jar and then brush the soil down along the sides. It does not have to be packed tightly, just filled to the top.

To collect ants, put about one tsp. of sugar water or jam into a separate jar or cup and place it outside on its side. This is your ant trap. You may want to set a few ant traps around your garden and be patient. It can take a few days for the ants to discover your bait, but once they do many will follow!

After your ant farm is made and the ants have been caught, quickly and carefully dump your ants inside your ant farm and screw on the cap. You'll want about 10-20 ants. I think we have about 5 ants in our jar...it takes a couple minutes to find them, but works just fine! They are busy digging all those tunnels and chambers all by themselves!

Once a week, open the lid to your jar and place a few drops of sugar water and/or a couple pieces of bird seed. You don't want to feed them too much, once a week is plenty! When you open your jar to feed the ants, plenty of fresh oxygen will enter the jar as well...no need for holes! Keep your ant farm indoors, not too hot and not too cold, away from direct sunlight. 

For more info on ants, check out some books at your local library and click here to see some fascinating photos and videos from National Geographic! Enjoy!!!

DIY Flower Fairies

I first made FLOWER FAIRIES with my youngest sister when we were kids. They are just so sweet, I couldn't wait to make them again with my girls! L and I made these fairies this past week and we plan on making more tomorrow...I'm thinking garlands, magnets, and of course, just flower fairy dolls for playing pretend! 

Materials needed:

-florist wire

-fabric flowers

-wooden beads

-other beads (wooden, plastic; colorful, plain)

-acrylic paint

-embroidery thread

-scissors

-hot glue gun and glue

First, paint simple, little faces on your wooden beads.

While your beads dry, take the artificial flowers apart. All you'll need is the fabric petals. If you have any tiny flowers, set them aside to use for head decorations. 

Cut a 14-inch piece of wire, and an 8-inch piece of wire. Fold the 14-inch piece in half. 

With the smaller piece, bring both ends towards the center and twist the wire, leaving a little loop on each side for the fairy's "hands." Set aside.

Select the colors of embroidery thread you'd like to use for the fairy's hair. Wrap the thread around all four of your fingers.

Place your looped, embroidery thread into the fold of the 14-inch piece of wire. Twist the wire, once to secure it in place. 

Next, thread a "head" onto the wires (the large wire folded in half), followed by a couple small or medium-sized flowers.

Take the small wire piece (already folded and twisted into arms) and place it under the flowers, but in-between the two wires. If you like, you can fold each arm over once to secure the arms in place a little more. 

Next, thread a bead onto the wire, followed by 2, 3, or more large flower petals. 

At this point, separate the long wires into two legs. Fold each one in half and twist the wire, leaving a little loop on each end for the fairy's "feet."

Time to style some hair! You can twist the hair and glue it on top the fairy's head. You can simply cut the thread loops and let it hang wild and free. Get creative with it!

To finish each flower fairy, glue a small flower on top of the hair. Too cute!!! 

To host a tea party for your flower fairies, be sure to check out our "It's Tea Time! Tea Party Ideas" page! 

DIY String Bowls

Before we packed up our Easter stuff, I decided to make some fun and funky STRING BOWLS with L...we used the bottoms of our Easter eggs for molds. How cute are these? And even better, all the materials needed we already had lying around the house...you probably do too! If you don't have Easter egg bottoms to use, any small or medium-sized bowls will work for molds. 

Materials needed:

-small plastic bowls or Easter egg bottoms

-yarn or string

-white glue

-water

-plastic wrap

-scissors

-glitter (optional)

-hair dryer (optional)

First, cover your molds with plastic wrap.

In a small bowl, mix a little bit of water into some white glue. If you like, mix some glitter into the glue as well.

Next, cut your string into small pieces and stir it into the glue. You can experiment with this step...we did one bowl using 1-inch pieces of yarn, another using 2-3 inch pieces, and one bowl using one long piece of string. 

Remove each piece of string from the glue, one at a time, and lay them across your mold. If the glue is thick on the string, you can squeeze some of the excess glue off. 

Once all your string is laid out across and around your molds, lay them aside to dry. It may take a couple days for the glue to dry completely, or you can speed up the process by using a hair dryer. 

After the glue has dried, turn your bowls over. Remove the molds and the plastic wrap.

Using fine-tipped scissors, you can trim any string or glue that you may need to off the edges. 

Beautiful and fun! Perfect for rings, hair clips, buttons and trinkets!