DIY Kid’s Desk Makeover

I’m always on the lookout for free and cheap stuff, particularly large pieces.  My toddler “J” has a ton of toys but not so many furniture items.

I was out walking the dog a few weeks ago and stumbled upon a kids’ plastic desk on the side of the street for free.  It would never have occurred to me to have purchased a young toddler a desk, but as soon as I saw it, I was sure it would be a useful piece.  We have a small table and chairs, but the chairs are a little high for “J” (who is not particularly tall for his age), and it’s hard for him to pull himself close to the table once he sits on a chair.  The desk is a perfect solution!  I also thought that the tilted desktop would be helpful for reading and drawing.  Sure enough, he LOVES it!

The desk was pretty ugly when I picked it up: it was dirty, not the prettiest in “style,” and had some stickers still have stuck on it.  I instantly went to work fixing it up.

I didn’t take the greatest pictures of it, but you can see it beforehand here:

 

It’s in the bathtub because I was starting to wash off the dirt.  Not the most appealing piece ,but it was structurally sound and had a decent overall design.

Steps:

1. Wash off the desk.
2. Sand the desk so that paint will adhere better.  This also removed the stickers that were on it, which I was very happy about.
3. Take the desk apart — I found that it was really easy to take off the side panels, so I decided to paint them a different color.
4. Spray paint with paint that’s meant for plastic — I did two coats.
5. Put the desk back together when it’s dry.  All done!  The paint says that it adheres to plastic best when it has a chance to dry for about a week, so I didn’t give it to “J” right away.

Here’s the final version!

 

This was my first experiment painting plastic and using spray paint, and I think it turned out well.  The paint does scratch off a little, so it’s probably not going to hold up for years, but so far, we’ve had no problems.

A few tips I’ve learned from the process:

1. Make sure you keep the spray can at a distance from what you are painting, and don’t hover over any spots too long.  I had a few problems with runny paint that would have been prevented by this.
2. Spraying over runny paint drips actually works to fix them.  I was shocked at how well it fixed the problems and made the drips disappear.
3. Be careful using a finishing coat.  I wanted to spray a clear coat on at the end to help seal it, but it just created a strange murky tint to it.  It was easy to spray more paint over the top when I realized I didn’t like this, but I would be wary of using a clear coat again as a result of this.  It’s possible that it didn’t work well because I sprayed it too soon after painting and/or because I did it in the garage when it was fairly cold out, and the paints usually suggest a somewhat warm ambient temperature.
4. Consider using a primer first.  All the things I read online seemed to suggest that you don’t really need a primer, but since doing this, I’ve started working on another project painting plastic, and I’ve found that using primer has made a big difference in how well it’s adhering and how it looks.

Happy DIYing and upcycling!

DIY “Books” or Cards

My toddler (“J”) loves looking at pictures in books, magazines, catalogs, and anything else he can get his hands on.  He particularly enjoys pictures of his favorite things (like electric drills, kitchen mixers, blenders, and trucks).

The other day, he made a grab for the Crate & Barrel catalog and found a picture of a mixer, which has been his most recent obsession after seeing me use it to make cookies and muffins.  He also found a picture of a blender, a slow cooker, and a toaster.

“J” would flip through the magazine in search of his favorite pictures, always wanting to close it for some reason and then open it again and find them.  Of course, it was difficult for his little fingers to turn the very thin pages, and the magazine was not holding up well to a lot of handling.  When “J” nearly had a tantrum because he was having trouble turning to the picture of the mixer, I decided it was time to take the mixer out of the magazine.

And so, the “trading cards” were born.  They are sort of half books, half trading cards.  My husband says they are like toddler baseball cards and that it would be funny if toddlers carried these around with pictures of their favorite equipment and traded with their friends.  That sounds pretty awesome to me, so get your toddler on board with us!

Materials:
Old magazines or catalogs with pictures of things your toddler recognizes and likes
Scissors
Cardboard remnants (I cut up an old box)
Mod Podge or other decoupage glue
Scrapbook paper, construction paper, or other colorful paper (optional)

Instructions:

1. Choose the pictures you plan to use and cut them out in the shapes you like.  You can cut closely around the objects if you want or can cut out squares or circles leaving some border around your object.  What works best depends a lot on the type of picture you have.  I tried to cut mine so that none of the advertising text was visible.
2. Cut cardboard pieces so that they are the size you want.  They should be big enough for at least one picture on each side, but you could also make them larger if you want to put more pictures on each page or if you just want a lot of “white space” around them.
3. (Optional:  Cut scrapbook or construction paper to the size of the cardboard pieces.  This will be the background for your pictures.)
4. Using Mod Podge or other decoupage glue, adhere the paper to the cardboard and then adhere the picture(s) on top.  I like to use decoupage glue because you can put it over the top of the pictures to seal them so that it won’t be easy for little fingers to pick at the edges and pull them off.  It also helps firm up the card/page a little and make it sturdier.
5. Let the glue dry.  If you are making two-sided cards/pages, it’s a good idea to do one side at a time and find a place where you can dry them in between gluing.

All done!  “J” loves these cards and carries them around with him when we go places in the car.  It’s much easier for him than flipping through the magazine, and it’s fun for him to flip them over and even use them as toys (putting them in and out of his toy trucks, building little tunnels with them, etc.).  I’m planning to do more of this in the future with different types of pictures.

Other Ideas:

• Use markers to write the names of the objects on each card, giving your child increased familiarity with seeing the written word.
• Cut up the cards, and use them as puzzles.  (Note: It’s difficult to cut these after finishing them.  I recommend cutting before gluing or using an X-Acto-type knife afterwards.)
• Make a bunch of cards and use them for playing games like “Go Fish!” or matching.
• Hang the cards on the wall as decorations.  You could use clothes pins and maybe boards nailed to the wall or yarn hung on the wall (as long as you make sure it’s not a strangulation hazard).  Your child could play with the cards and the clothes pins and enjoy putting them up and taking them down again.
• If you have an older child, you could do this project together.  It’s very simple and safe, as long as you closely supervise the cutting.  I recommend that an adult be the one to cut the cardboard, since it is tough to cut and will require a sharper knife.

Flour Play

Since we’ve been talking about other fun kitchen play (with rice, with potatoes, with water), I had to do a post on good ol’ flour.

It’s been snowing here, and my toddler (“J”) has been really interested in the snow.  I decided to make him some “fake snow” out of flour so that he could push it around with his bulldozers and pretend they were snowplows.  As it turned out, we didn’t get that far because he loved playing with it with regular kitchen utensils so much!  (Plus, I wasn’t in a hurry to get his toy trucks full of flour.)

A few weeks ago, I bought a plastic fold-out table from IKEA that’s meant for having breakfast in bed or in front of the TV.  I had been searching for a short table that “J” could use when he helps in the kitchen, and I hoped this would be perfect.  It is!  It’s easy to clean, relatively large, folds up so that I can store it in a kitchen cabinet, and is sturdy enough that he can put his weight on it without destroying it (though it’s debatable how many more times he can SIT on it before it breaks).  I can’t seem to find it online, but you can see it in these pictures.  I highly recommend it!

Materials:
Flour
Kitchen utensils and containers (i.e. spoons, bowls, cups)
A place to play (table, mat on the floor, etc.)

Instructions:

1. Give the flour to your child, and let the fun begin!
2. For added enjoyment (but a larger mess), you can also give your child a small amount of water to mix into the flour.

I let “J” play for a little while with the flour alone and then gave him a small cup of water.  He immediately and happily dumped the water into the flour and turned to me with an enthusiastic, “More!”

Don’t forget to rinse your table and utensils soon after you finish playing, or it will be really hard to get that watery flour off!

 

Cardboard Box Tunnel

What’s more fun than a cardboard box?  Isn’t there a joke that you spend money on a gift, but the baby or toddler likes the box more than the item you bought?

A good cardboard box can be TONS for fun.  My toddler “J” can find something to do with a box of almost any size.  A favorite game is to climb inside the box and then try to fill it with all of his toys, burying himself in the process.  He also enjoys sitting in cardboard boxes and having us push him around like he’s in a boat.

We ordered some frames online recently, and because they had glass in them, they sent them in a ton of packaging.  As a result, we ended up with one large cardboard box that I just knew we could find a good use for.

After “J” was finished with his sitting-in-the-box games, I flipped it over and cut out the sides to make a tunnel.  It was large enough that he could climb through it himself, as well as push his toy trucks and cars through it.  He got a huge smile as he happily plopped down and crawled through.

Such an easy, free toy!  And there are so many possibilities for how to use it!  Just one word of caution — if you cut off the sides to make a tunnel, the stability of the box is greatly weakened, so you should try to leave a lip at the top, and you may need to use packing tape or something else to support the sides.  Our box was strong enough to survive about two days of play before we had to reinforce it.

 

 

Potato Fun

Today was a snow day for us, so we were in search of things to keep ourselves busy around the house.  My toddler “J” loves his trucks and “boys” (as he calls his toy people).  Sometimes we play with them outside in the sandbox, sometimes with rice or noodles inside, and sometimes he likes to put his smaller trucks into his larger trucks and haul them around.

We have a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture — we order ahead for the season and then pick up every weekend), so we don’t always know what we are going to get week-to-week.  Lately there have been a LOT of root vegetables, especially potatoes.  Our neighbors were gone over Thanksgiving and gave us their CSA share, so despite making a ton of mashed potatoes and potato soup, we are still overloaded with raw potatoes.

These potatoes are sitting in paper bags in the bottom of a rolling cart we have in the kitchen.  Today “J” discovered them for the first time and decided they were the best thing ever!  I would never have expected raw potatoes to be so much fun.

Reasons raw potatoes are awesome toys:

1. They often have a little dirt on them still, which makes them very engaging for the senses and causes them to bring in a sense of the outdoors.
2. They are something you often have around the house.
3. They last almost forever before going bad.  If they have “eyes,” all the more fun to play with!
4. You can easily manhandle them without causing major bruises or making them inedible.  Your child can play with them for hours, and then you can put them back in their bag and wait another month before cooking them!
5. You do not need to worry about them getting dirty, since we would need to wash them before cooking anyway (and maybe peel them, depending on how you are using them).
6. They are natural, , compostable, and environmentally friendly.
7. They (probably) won’t be as appealing to your dog/cat/hamster as other foods might be.  Just to be on the safe side, we put our dog outside while we played (it’s okay — we have a covered porch, so he didn’t have to lay in the snow).
8. They come in various sizes and look/feel a bit like rocks, making them great for construction play.

“J” dumped them out of the bag, piled them into his play pots and pans, carried them around, took them out of the pots and pans, put them back in, carried the pots and pans around, dumped them out, put his toy “boys” with the potatoes, and generally just explored them and had fun.  Such an easy, fun toy!

DIY Play Mailbox

If your toddler is like mine, he or she loves putting things in and taking them out again.  What better place to do this than a mailbox?

We go outside to get the mail together most days, and “J” seems to like it a lot, so I made him his own play mailbox.  It was intended to go on the door to his playroom closet, as though that were his “house,” but when it was attached to the wall, he could pull it apart too easily, so I took it down and just use it unattached.  If your child is a bit older and/or you make sure to tape it more securely, you could probably adhere to a door or wall without a problem.

Materials:

Used (or new) U.S. Postal Service mailing box
Scrapbook or other nice-looking paper
Paste or other type of glue
Stickers for decorating (optional)
Additional pieces of cardboard for making “postcards” (optional)

Instructions:

1.  Deconstruct your cardboard box and cut off unnecessary sides.

2.  Cover the outside with paper as desired, making sure to include enough of an extra amount on the inside so that you will see a continuation of the nice-looking paper when you glance inside (rather than unfinished cardboard).  You could meticulously cover every inch of the box with paper, but neither you nor your child will really see into the deep inside, so it’s perfectly fine to be a little lazy in your covering.

3.  Put the box together using paste and/or clear tape.  I used paste, but it was not very strong, so although tape would ruin the line a little, I think it might be a good idea to use some clear packing tape.

4.  If desired, add stickers or other details to the box.  I had some extra scrapbook stickers, so I used them to write “Mailbox” and “123 Main St” on the one I made.

5.  Optional:  Use cardboard and extra paper to make postcards or “letters” that can be put in and taken out.  Alternatively (or additionally), you can let your little one put other little things into the box, or you can use real envelopes or junk mail.

Happy mailing!

Colorful Water Fun

 

I love food coloring.

Today we took it outside and played with colorful water.  Because I didn’t want my toddler (“J”) to squeeze an entire vial into a small cup and then immediately dump it on the ground, I put them up on our fence and was personally in charge of adding them as needed.  This was a great way for him to practice the names of colors: “Green!  Blue!  Yellow!”  For some reason, he never asked for red.

This was definitely messy and wet.  I brought out the garden hose and turned it on very low so J could use it himself without getting very wet and we weren’t wasting a ton of water.  To be honest, I think J would have been just as happy with the water alone, but the food coloring made for a fun change of pace.

Materials:

Garden hose or other water source

Food coloring

Containers and spoons, etc., to play with (we used pots/pans and utensils from Goodwill)

Instructions:

1. Dress yourself and your child for the possibility of getting wet.  It’s best to do this on a relatively warm or hot day.
2. Collect your containers and utensils, and set up a play area in a place that is accessible to your water source.
3. Put some water in some of the containers, add a little food coloring, and have fun!