Act of Kindness- Planting Love
11:32 AM |
| Plant so Love
Teaching Acts of Kindness has become a must in our home since last
year. We do activities that the kids are able to participate in and then
package them up. We usually place the project in the mailboxes of our
neighbors. Nobody has complained so far.
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For this month Act of Kindness we made
seed paper, drew hearts on them, placed them in little baggies and attached an
index card explaining what the object was and what it was for.
The seed paper was made a few days ago.
The process to make seed paper is more in depth than open a package and go.
NEEDED:
Shredded Paper
Metal bowl
Water
Hand mixer
Seeds
Pasta strainer
Cookie sheet with sides
Rolling pin
Old towels
We took our junk mail and shredded it into
strips. My son enjoyed ripping the paper and making a paper mess. Once the
paper was shredded, we placed it in a metal mixing bowl and covered with water
(hot water works into the paper faster). Let the paper sit for at least 10
minutes for the water to soak into the paper.
I suggest the metal bowl as the ink will
be coming off the paper and staining your bowl. I was able to use a Brillo pad
to remove the ink from the bowl.
We used a hand mixer because I don't like
to use my food blender for our projects. Using the hand mixer does take a
little longer but still effective. We mixed until the paper is mush.
After the paper is mush, we took a box of
"butterfly mix" seeds and poured the seeds into the mush. I can't
give an exact measurement but we poured and mixed with a spoon until we could
see the seeds throughout the mush.
Now that you have paper mush with seeds in
it, it is time to get MESSY! We put our metal pasta strainer in the sink and
dumped the paper mush into it. Press the mush against the sides of the strainer
to release as much of the water you can.
Now press the paper mess into a metal
cookie sheet with sides. Take a rolling pin and smooth the mixture as much as
you can.
Now time to use an old towel and lay it
over the top of the paper mess. Use the rolling pin while applying pressure to
press out more water. Once you have this side looking dry, flip the cookie
sheet over onto another towel and press the other side. You need to get as much
water out of the mixture as possible.
For the final drying step, we put the
paper mess back into the cookie sheet, placed it into the oven. The oven was
set on 250 degrees Fahrenheit. It took about 30 minutes. However, depending on
how much water is still in the mixture varies the drying time. Keep an eye on
it so it does not burn.
TIME FOR FUN....
We used a pizza cutter to make squares of
paper. We colored hearts on each paper square. Placed the paper squares into
some of my jewelry bags and stapled a decorated index card.
Each index card explained that the seed
paper was an Act of Kindness and to plant the seed paper and watch some love
grow. To deliver the gifts we bundled the kids in snowsuits, walked to each of
the neighbors, and placed them into the mailboxes.
This project was one of our more elaborate
ones for my son to do. We did everything in steps, took breaks and finished in
two days.
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