It had been a while since I had made Gracen a photo book, so a couple of weeks ago, I selected some photos (the hardest part when you have as many as I do) to make her a knock-off version of the Usborne That’s Not My…. books. If you haven’t come across these books yet, you should really check them out. They’re short, simple stories with strong repetition, touch and feel parts, and bold, colourful illustrations.
I actually first fell in love with them when my friend and teaching partner at the time was selling Usborne and read one aloud at a book party. It was probably the best read aloud I’ve listened to before in my life. Since moving to Vancouver, we started signing them out from our local libraries, and they’ve quickly become family favourites.
Here are some pages from the version I whipped up for Miss G… (Please forgive my made up words in advance. ☺)
Gracen LOVES this new little book. (What’s not to like – it’s all about her!)
The best part is that these books are super easy to put together, can be added to at any time, and can easily be reprinted if needed. Not to mention that they put some of those photos just sitting on the computer to good use too!
You can check out Grae’s Body Parts, and Friends & Family, and Gracen Loves books by clicking on the links.
Squeeeeeeeze…
Spread it around…
Marvel at the beauty of your artwork while whispering ‘wooooooooooooow’…
Then fold it over and smush!
Open it up to reveal your beautiful butterfly!
Over and over if you wish.
‘Have a colourful Valentine’s Day!’ cards with 
A bigger version of the same card for her cousins Korbin, Chayton, and Kinslee.
And also for the cousins – felt heart hair clips for the little girls…
And felt tic-tac-toe boards for the big boys.
And something special for Papa too…
A handmade card card stamped with her little hands and feet. 
♥
Today we spent our afternoon doing a bunch of little art projects for Valentine’s Day.
Gracen happily drew a “picture” on the back of each of her little friends’ cards.
All we have to do tomorrow is attach the 
Our next project involved punching out hundreds of little paint chip hearts… Technically Grae wasn’t the one doing the punching, but she was a great assistant.
Her real job was getting each little heart into this container for safe keeping. Of course this job was right up her alley because it involved transferring objects from one place to another. Little weirdo.
And while all those paper hearts kept Miss G busy, I worked on some Valentine’s Day hair clips for Grae and her little cousin, Kinslee.
Our last project of the afternoon involved a wax / watercolour resist. First, Gracen scribbled all over white card stock with white crayons…
Then we cut out a bunch of hearts, taped them down to some plastic, and painted them using homemade watercolours.
It took a minute for Grae to really get into the painting part (at first she was squeezing and shaking the paint out of the brush), but once she got the idea, she went for it.
Tada! Another masterpiece by Miss G. :) We’ll let them dry overnight and tomorrow she’ll hang them up on her bedroom door. And just in time. Only 3 days left!
Now the project actually calls for old broken crayon chunks, but since our collection wasn’t large enough yet, we supplemented with some new crayons too. Gracen was an excellent paper peeler.
She was also in charge of breaking the crayons into chunks.
Then I helped by chopping them up into smaller chunks with a knife.
Then we stuffed our heart shaped mold as full as it could be.
We popped the whole thing into a warm oven…
And watched the crayons slowly melt.
And before long, it was time to take them out.
We let them cool a while and then popped them out of the molds.
Presto! Heart-shaped crayons. Very simple, but made with love. Tomorrow we’ll work on the cards to attach them to…
Gracen absolutely adores the little colouring book we made for her ‘Christmas in January’ stocking. She loves pointing out her family members and having me tell her about what’s happening in the pictures. We’ve already coloured 4 pages today, and it’s still morning!
All we did was take some of our favourite photos of her and her cousins, pop them into Photoshop, and turn them into line drawings rather than photos. Then I printed them all on card stock, bound them, and that was it!
Here’s my cool girl helping her Mama with grocery shopping.
This is my all time favourite picture of Grae and her cousin, Kinslee, who is exactly 6 weeks younger than her.
Of course, her cousin, ‘SuperChay’, had to be in the colouring book.
And here’s one of her cousin Korbin’s pages.
The best part is that while we colour, we can talk about all the fun memories that fill the pages. This photo was taken when Grae’s cousins came to visit us in Vernon and we all visited the pool for Chayton’s birthday. I have a feeling these little colouring books will become a yearly tradition in our family. :)
