Making pebble mosaics @ WBCL

I was given a box of 6x6 tiles and some plaster earlier this year. I thought that would be the perfect start for this project. We mixed the plaster with water and a little school glue but it hardened up way to fast. So on to plan 2, just use the glue. 
First the participants drew their designs with pencil onto the tiles. Next they started filling areas with glue then adding the colored stones. They did need to be reminded that it was essential to use enough glue to hold the stones--Do Not Stint on the glue. Everyone seemed to have good time and turned out some great designs.

Making cork bugs @WBCL

What to do with a HUGE donation of wine corks that is both fun and able to be done by many ages of participants? The answer of course is make a bug from the cork. We had both plastic and real cork ones to work with and used both. I pre-drilled the leg holes on all of them and brought 16 penny nails to class to use as punches if needed.


We used colored chenille stems for the legs and to attach the wooden bead head while creating the antenea. Some added wings too.Each leg got a small wooden bead for a foot to give it some stability and counter the weight of the cork body. Some of the participants even created flowers for the bugs to sit on.

Making Mother's Day cards @WBCL

This activity draws out the creativity of the group as everyone creates a card for the special mom or grandmom or aunt or friend who is a mom. We used half sheets of colored paper as a base and set out scrapbook papers, markers and crayons, and a few other bits of things to use in decorating and constructing the perfect card. Each person seemed to know exactly what their card needed to make it perfect. I found a pile of colored envelopes to use that one of my painting friends gave us for the classes last year--Hallmark, no less. These also got a bit of decorating and quite a few got a message. Bet there were pleased moms on their day.

Paper flowers for Cinco de Mayo @ WBCL

A few sheets of tissue paper, a bead, an egg carton cup and a chenille stem is all it takes to create these colorful flowers. I made them as a child from colored kleenex but the tissue paper is easier to deal with. We fan-folded the paper and secured it with a stem then began to fluff out the flowers.