Eco Kids Projects | Mommyfootprint.com

Aug 8

I’m so happy to write about a long awaited eco-activity we’ve recently finished – building a fairy garden and fairy house. It’s been my 6 year old son urging me to help him make fairy furniture and design plans for the house which has been a very cool surprise…I always thought this would be something I’d create with my daughter’s so I’m thrilled my boys thought this was a fun idea. Creating the garden, furniture and house was so much easier thanks to the awesome tutorials at The Magic Onions. I’ve talked about this site before because it’s the ultimate resource for convincing non-crafty folk like myself that I can create some of nature’s magic with my own children.

It was so heart warming to me that one of my son’s was so determined to get this project off the ground. We had so much fun and I’m proud that all of the materials for the garden came from our yard or nearby forests…nothing needed to be purchased and borrowing a glue gun from my friend became another fun highlight for my kids (glue guns make crafting so much fun!). Our garden doesn’t come close to the artistic design that The Magic Onion achieves with her blog but check out the pictures at the end of this article – I think we did pretty good and even managed to create a new item that is the perfect accent for any fairy’s garden (hint: think acorns and hemp string).

I loved the idea of finding a wine barrel for the garden, but we used an over sized planter currently not being used. Whatever you use, make sure it’s large enough because your children will want to play with the garden when it’s completed. Also, have potting soil and make sure the container/planter/barrel has a hole in the bottom for drainage purposes because you’ll need to water your garden to keep the moss and flowers alive.

We didn’t draw out our our fairy garden before hand – but I do recommend it. Having your child map out on a sheet of paper where everything will go is a very magical step in the process and a great keep-sake. We filled up our planter with potting soil and dirt, pulled out a small flowering plant with roots intact from our main garden and replanted it in our fairy garden. Angelo found a plastic container to use for our fairy pond, then we put marbles around it with a path. Now came the fun – fairy doors, fairy furniture, and the fairy house! I followed all the instructions from The Magic Onions except for the one piece of decor within the fairy garden that was dreamed up by my sweet boy Angelo – lantern lights to hang high above the garden to light the way for fairies and gnomes. Angelo is always picking up acorns wherever we go – they are a staple item collected for his nature box. We used some hemp string and tied approx. 6 acorns together and attached to taller branches. These became our fairy lanterns ~ funny what ideas you start to imagine when you believe that fairies really do exist.

We really enjoyed making fairy furniture from the tutorials at The Magic Onions: fairy bath tub, fairy dining table, and our favourite the fairy’s washing line! This is the drying line where fairies leave their extra set of wings or dresses after they’ve been dampened by the morning dew. If you have tiny clothes pegs – that is best. For the clothing line – I used the annoying ties that you need to unwind when receiving a new toy. You know those grey ties that you fight with to ‘release’ the toy after your child unwraps it? Well my mom pointed out a few summers ago that she loves using them for tying back plants in the garden. I started saving them too because they do come in handy. They worked perfectly to tie around two sticks to create our clothing line. Here are our pictures:

After our fairy garden was complete we sat back and enjoyed our accomplishment for only a few days before Angelo decided that a house needed to be built. Thankfully, our wonderful friend Patti had many examples from her own adventures so we followed the fantastic model of no gluing, no tying to get our log house built. We simply cut approx. 20 sticks to the same size and built 4 walls (with a gap for a door) by pushing the sticks down into the soil of our fairy garden. Our roof and fairy door was made from tree bark; easy to break and mold into the shape needed for both. I love that Angelo went into the yard and was so excited that he found the perfect door knob for the fairy door – a dandelion top that hadn’t blossomed yet. It was perfect for a knob and we used the glue gun to attach it to the door. Very easy to build and our garden is almost complete. We used all materials that were already on-hand or found on a forest floor. The last surprise will be the little ladies and goodies I have arriving from The Enchanted Cupboard. I’ve long been a fan of artist and mom Beccijo who hand paints wooden treasures and has truly captured the magic of fairies and mermaids in her lovely Etsy shop.

Here are the final pictures from our fairy garden and house. So fun and hopefully a summer memory that my kids will always remember – I know I will.

The Fairy Ring ~ Etsy Wooden Fairy Dolls

Celebrate Your Little Girl’s Love For Fairies – Make A Toadstool!

Jul 19

Geocaching – Eco Activity For Entire Family

Have you ever heard of geocaching? Most people have heard of it but haven’t tried it. My first exposure to geocaching was reading a course description on my city’s parks board months ago. From that moment I was hooked. If you are looking for ways to keep children entertained wouldn’t the following description be enticing? “A worldwide game of hiding and seeking treasure using technology.” Treasure hunting at any age ~ what’s not to like?

Unable to register my boys for the course – the wonderful geocaching duo behind Geocaching101 were introduced to me and spoiled myself and my boys to a personal introduction to Geocaching this afternoon. I wanted to share the experience immediately because it was so beneficial and rewarding. Literally, I’ve done nothing else but look up caches in my area since coming home from the outing. I can understand why there’s a warning on most geocaching sites about possible addictions. =) I think I’ve caught the bug and it’s great this new activity will be relatively inexpensive and so healthy for my children and family. For anyone struggling with keeping older kids entertained and away from TV, computers, and video games this summer – learning how to geocache may just be your ticket to enjoying the next few months outdoors.

Before I start on my rant about boys and electronics I’ll remember I’ve already written about this. It’s a daily battle with all my kids to keep them focused on nature and activities rather than jumping onto the computer or firing up the Wii. With geocaching it’s two wonderful worlds colliding for children – electronic GPS system (or iphone app) and treasure hunting in nature. Really, what isn’t to like? Only…in a child’s mind it gets better….they are hunting treasures. And this isn’t the point of geocaching and shouldn’t be an important part of your geocaching experience, but let’s just think like children for a moment ~ and once they are told they’ll be discovering treasure – they are very exited! Once you have loaded the coordinates into your GPS or iphone and located the cache – usually there is a log book so they can sign their name and swap trinkets. Yes, the trinkets are normally plastic because they need to be permeable to wet weather, but the children are simply thrilled by this aspect of geocaching. The thrill for many children and adults is the adrenaline rush of the ‘find’. Getting close to the cache, resisting the need to check the clue, then searching around for that perfectly hidden cache is the true thrill of geocaching. And it’s so exciting to find the cache…but knowing there are treasures inside was exciting for my boys today and we even found a cache located at a park 2 blocks from our house after we got home…without the asssitance of a GPS. Just putting our postal code into the ‘hide and seek’ section of the www.geocaching.com site we found a cache very easily and will try this route because we don’t have a GPS system or iphone. My boys left hockey cards and even my girls were excited by the treasures.

If this information feels overwhelming, just post a comment to this article and we’ll help you out. I slightly begged Anthony and Gwen to further develop private geocaching tours because I’d love to take my boys and their buddies (and parents) on a geocaching expedition. If you ask around your friend base, hopefully you’ll be lucky enough to find someone that can show you the geocaching ropes. Once you discover the magic – it’s hard to go back to being a Muggle. Umm yes, the activity of geocaching even has reference to ‘Muggles’ which as we know from Harry Potter refers to people that are non-wizards or in this case, non-geocachers. In the log notes that are left after discovering a cache, nearby people that aren’t aware of geocaching, are referred to as Muggles and in our house right now, there isn’t a more cool topic that anything referencing Harry Potter and wizards.

I will be writing more over the next few months on geocaching. I strongly urge any mom looking for an activity for children to register for free at the geocaching site: www.geocaching.com. First you create a free account, then you click on the ‘hide & seek a cache’ tab and submit your postal code. You’ll be surprised how close a cache may be to your home. Check it out by downloading to a GPS or using the iphone application or just try finding it on your own using Google Maps or the directions located within the cache. Here are some pictures and highlights of the fun we experienced this afternoon!

Locating our first cache. We were so lucky it was an official, large cache box – it had awesome clues and coordinates and funny enough – it was hidden near a spot my boys have played next to for years!

Another cache we found was hidden in the bottom of a 10 foot high tree stump and covered with a piece of bark. This type of coverage is referred to as geocaching bark – I’ll never look at carefully placed bark again without assuming there are treasures beneath it.

When I first read about geocaching I really assumed it was for older children. But after spending the day with Anthony & Gwen Floyd and @seanfunk’s family – I know that like anything…really fun activies that are discovered with an entire family are the best. We had toddlers on our geocaching tour today and they were incredibly well-behaved and excited by this activity. Read more about geocaching with toddlers here. The below picture is of Anthony with his little guy in the backpack - both were happy as could be!

Our 2nd to last cache found was a magnet stuck under a park bench. The two muggles that were sitting on the bench as over 10 people excitedly approached was pretty funny. They had no idea what we were doing – but Angelo was super excited to find a very small cache stuck underneath the bench.

I feel so lucky to be introduced to so many fun activities in a quest to keep my kids engaged in nature. Thank you to Gwen, Anthony, and @seanfunk - it was a great day and launching pad for discovering caches with my kids.

Apr 14

Earth Day 2010 ~ How Will You Celebrate

Earth Day is coming and I’ve been comparing this year’s Earth Day buzz to Christmas. It might even be busier in our household than any December I can remember – the emphasis on April 22nd is apparent in every corner of the community this year.

Also helping keep me on my toes, I was approached to guest write for an amazing online newsletter called Savvymom with a series of 2 articles on greener options for families. The article titles are Eco Fun: Storm Drain Marking and Tips to Improve Your Home’s Health. Both of these articles have some great ideas for both parents and children wanting to make a difference in their community and home. One thing I’ve learned with writing at Mommy Footprint is any steps you make to help the environment will reward you with improving your family’s health. If you are wanting to talk to your children about Earth Day and why it’s important, but don’t have time for any big projects, simply make a change in your home and explain that you are helping the Earth and helping improve the quality of your family’s environment. Big or small changes – they all matter and are important.

I have a small role in helping plan a Earth Day Fair this year and am feeling very inspired about community and family involvement. To find an Earth Day event in your neighbourhood, click on the link at Earth Day 2010 (US zip codes only). For people in Canada click on the Earth Day Canada site for events.

My advice for parents wanting to participate or encourage their children this April 22nd is pick something you all find inspiring. If you have wrapped your mind around trying to reduce the amount of toxic materials in your life, discussing with family this month is a great start. I found this puzzle today from the artists at Just Hatched in the US that really celebrate Earth Day everyday with their commitment to using more sustainable materials to create toys. I wanted to share an example of something so simple. and earthy. and inspiring. Surrounding our lives with better choices for the environment the other 374 days of the year is also a great pledge to make. Keeping your family footprint lighter with supporting local, sustainable choices, made with natural materials just feels so good!

Have fun planning your special mark with your family this Earth Day.

Apr 2

Earthy Easter Inspiration

Sometimes we all need a little ‘earthy inspiration’ surrounding holidays that are surrounded in plastic packaging, plastic gifts, commercialism, and loads of artificially coloured & sweetened goodies. When researching this article, it was amazing the physical effect these pictures and products had on my body – I felt my stress just melt away so I wanted to share. There are some seriously talented people that contribute earthy magic to Easter this year. Enjoy!

Wonderful article from Green Baby Guide on naturally dying Easter eggs with using beautiful silhouettes of nature. My clan will be working on some fern prints tomorrow – we just mastered the white crayon and dye technique today.

My favourite writer and artist this Easter has been the Linda behind the blog Natural Suburbia where she shares her patterns and thoughts on homeschooling with a waldorf based curriculum. Her adorable creations are so special because they embrace the classic waldolf styles, but also have ‘kid appeal’ that children would love and want to play with. Get ready to be relaxed and inspired.

Hand Knit Easter egg tutorial and Egg tree instructions:

Felted bird nest tutorial:

Angora knit bunny from her shop for purchase:

Feb 21

Fairy Doors, Fairy Dust, The Makings For A Magical Party Game

I’ve mentioned my kids attend a magical preschool, where play and imagination is the main focus. I’ve also learned that when you combine creative parents into the mix ~ magical things happen. A few weeks ago, the children from my twins’ class were taken into the nearby woods for a forest walk. I’m so happy I stayed to help that day because I watched an amazing adventure unfold! We started out along our regular trail and started to notice ‘fairy dust’ sparkling on the forest floor. Leading from the forest trail were little pathways of glitter that the teacher’s pointed out must have been left by fairies. Well upon further investigation the children (and parents) noticed fairy doors with accessories leaned up against the bottoms of trees and the effect was amazing. The doors with ladders, door knobs, windows, & fairy jewels melted into the forest and were beautifully earthy and playful – just like the gnomes and fairies that dance and play (we decided) within the trees.

This wonderful bonus in addition to walking through the forest on a glorious sunny day was so imaginative and I appreciated the effort from one very creative parent in our class. One of the moms had crafted the fairy doors herself and come to the forest the day before the forest walk and built little walkways to the doors with sticks, crafted ladders, propped up paper umbrellas so the fairies could sip their drinks without getting their wings wet from the rain, and more! Her older children had helped her ~ what a great eco-activity for children! And don’t think this is only for preschoolers. After my older sons had finished school for the day, I took them to the forest that they had walked through for so many years attending the same preschool and they were SO excited by seeing the fairy doors. “I can’t believe they are real! Look – here is the proof!” … my boys kept saying to each other. We told them to be gentle because if they forced a fairy door to open, it would vanish into air – but knocking was okay.

I have the eternal love for fairies inside me and hope to pass that to my girls (my boys obviously have it already) and I hope to decorate the nearby forest by my house with some fairy doors of my own this summer. Sharing the magic with a simple fairy door adds to the beauty of any forest and imagine the glee a child would experience by finding one unexpectedly? I also thought this would be amazing for a fairy themed birthday party. You could do an eye-spy version at the party and leave goodie bag items at each tree stump ‘from the fairies’ like wooden wands to decorate, hand made fairy furniture, and more!

If you’ve been thinking of creating a fairy garden – you only need to look at these two sites. The site called The Magic Onions will have your heart on-fire for any fairy fans. Check out her Fairy Garden and numerous articles on making fairy furniture. She is amazing!! I’ve also purchased from and been a long time fan of The Enchanted Cupboard. Her wooden fairy dolls and sets are magical and the perfect addition to any fairy garden or child’s playroom.

From Rosie ~ our wonderful preschool mom, to The Magic Onion and her dedication to sharing the magic of creating fairy themed items from nature, to award winning artist Beccijo – I only need to peek inside your worlds and become inspired – thanks for sharing ladies!