You Cut, They Paste (and sometimes paint)

Some days, Natalie wants to watch a lot of TV and others she doesn't.  On the days she wants to watch more than I want her to, I've started the compromise that she can watch if we do related crafts while the movie is on.  We first did this with Bee Movie and bee crafts.

We put in WALL-E the other day and I put out tin foil shapes to make robots.  I was very impressed when Natalie (aged 2.5) insisted that she glue the pieces on herself to make WALL-E and EVE.  (Can I also add that she has started a WALLE game, too.  She is WALLE and I'm EVE and she brings me toys to look at like when WALLE shows EVE all this possessions in his home). 

Here she is finishing up EVE.

WALLE is on the top and EVE on the bottom.  The marker scribble is the cockroach WALLE.  She made these with just basic shapes. 

A few days later, we were watching Lilo and Stitch and she said she wanted to make ... guess who ... Lilo and Stitch, and then later Nani.  Since I didn't want her to just sit watching the TV, I got out the construction paper and the glue stick and cut out the pieces for her on the fly.  I cut, she glued.  Again, I was super impressed how well she glued everything into place with very little help from me.  She's already asked to make Lilo again more than once. 

Nani, Lilo, and Stitch.  We didn't have any red paper for Lilo's dress.  I cut out the shapes specifically for this craft and she put them all together. 

Here she is in her hula outfit gluing a second Stitch on a different day.

Our second set of Lilo and Stitch.  She said she wanted to make them doing the hula.

Here are Lilo, Nani, David, and Stitch surfing.  It was her idea to make this scene, but it was a little too complicated for her to put together, so I did a lot of the gluing.  In hindsight, a larger sheet of paper probably would have made the difference. 

Then today, when Natalie asked to watch Cars, she said she wanted to paint Lightning McQueen.  So, I set her up with the paint, and while she painted, I cut out the shapes of the main characters.  After she was done with her painting, we then painted the shapes of the cars and glued them on to a big poster board.  This project took almost an hour!  I was really proud of Natalie's attention span, and also her attention to detail on most of the pieces.  For myself, I was proud of my ability to let go of control and let her paint Sally purple-ish and Guido with only a little blue.  It was cute how after she finished each car she said something like, "Okay, guys, all done!"  Natalie helped glue this one, too, but I put the pieces down since they were still very wet with paint.

The final product!

Here she is painting and you can see Lightning McQueen paving in the background.

She was very methodical with Luigi

Close up of Lightning McQueen.  Yes, he is kinda purple ... and I just let it go.  I did give him the lightning blot. 

Close up of Mater. 

Close up of Guido.  (My husband and I love when Guido changes the tires in the final race). 

Close up of Luigi.  I gave him his hat, but we didn't have any black paint.  That's why all the tires are funky colors. 

I really loved these projects and can see us doing them over and over in different variations.  Not only do we have a huge cast of TV, movie, and book characters to make, but different mediums to explore.

Here are some ideas I'm thinking about for the future:

• Care Bears with different colors of construction paper with stickers for the tummies.  
• Muppets like Kermit, Elmo, and Bert.  Maybe use felt or fake fur for the monsters.  
• The Very Hungry Caterpillar with tissue paper.  Make circles for the caterpillar and glue down tissue shapes over a template of the butterfly wings.  
• Piggie and Elephant, probably craft foam unless I buy some gray construction paper