Product Review ~Glue dots~

Nothing has been greeted with more crafting joy here at the Crafty Homeschooler than the birth of Glue Dots. What, you don't know what Glue Dots are? Well come here and sit at my knee while I extol the virtues of this little adhesive wonder.

Glue Dots are cute little double-sided dots of adhesive that form a strong, instant, mess-free bond taking the place of the often dangerous glue guns of the past. The Dots come in multiple sizes and adhesive strengths and quickly bond paper, plastic, wood and metal. It should also be noted that while they will not bond cats they will bond TO cats so keep them away from pets unless you really like sitting for 2 or more hours with a tiny pair of cuticle scissors cutting dots out of the coat of a very grumpy marbled tabby cat who laid down on a strip of exposed Dots.

Despite small animal mishaps the hands down the best part about Glue Dots is that there is no more frustrated waiting for glue to dry between steps of a project.The bond is instant and quite strong when using the appropriately sized permanent version. Anybody who has crafted with children knows that *now* is way better than the "takes 15 mins. to 2 hours to dry" of normal glues. This benefit means that projects that took days can now take hours. Projects started on one day can be finished and cleaned up the same day. No more in process project messes resting on the dinning room table when it comes time to eat that night! At under $4 for a box of 300 dots this is one product no crafty household should be without.

Gingerbread Dreams

The season of light also means the season of gingerbread here at the Crafty Homeschooler. For years I sweated through multiple batches of sticky sweet dough, making templates and buying a kings fortune in tiny European candy for decorations only to find that the kids and I did not share a vision as to how the house should look in the end.

I dreamed of gently frosted candy roof tiles, lovingly placed peppermints and tiny little ginger men. The children seemed to believe that globs of frosting, 1 zillion assorted colored jimmies and some seriously slipshod construction was the path to Nutcracker dreams. To say that this did not settle well with my rather OCD holiday issues would be an understatement and one that I really wanted to resolve to both their satisfaction and mine.

Our solution came from the fine folks at Wilton. With at least two different gingerbread house kits each season there is no reason for me to become emotionally involved in their process. So if the kids choose to construct something looking more like a tenement house for wayward elves than my sugar plum visions that is ok with me. Since without the hours of dough making investment I can enjoy their quirky constructions and that makes all of us happy.

At under $12 per kit this is an easy and affordable project that will keep kids happy and busy for the better part of an afternoon.

To make things even smoother I offer these few suggestions.

Pre assemble the house the night before without little person involvement. Yes, perhaps this does take away a bit of the magic if by "magic" you mean children with tears of frustration from having to wait as the sugar icing construction glue hardens and drys. A solid house needs 4-6 hours to dry, keep this in mind.

Pre make the frosting/glue and divide the bounty into heavy duty zippered food storage bags to use as piping bags. Multiple bags will mean that you can rotate bags as they get warm from being clutched in happy little decorator hands.

Buy extra candy to decorate with. Divide candies into muffin trays for easy use. The kit does come with a nice selection but after 3+ children sample one of each of the candies the numbers do seem to dwindle a bit. Necco waffers make wonderful roof tiles, and tend to stay around since I can't happen to stand them so am not tempted to pick them off the less visible side of the roof as the holiday passes. This is also a great time to use up left over Halloween candy. We never seem to have much of that but have been known to polish off the last few packages of Smarties by using them on the house.

With the use of the included sugar icing the house is totally edible but the quality does suffer over time. The Crafty Homeschooler family trys to hold off any *sampling* of the house till Christmas day. But it has been noted that like an unattended house in a dodgy part of town parts have been known to go missing, but that is just part of the fun.

The Crafty Homeschoolers Rates this: Easy, with preparation!

Holiday Delights

Ah the holidays, gingerbread, twinkling lights, paper snow flakes and glitter. In hopes of keeping it all under control this season I am picking one largish project to do per week in December with a few smaller on going projects to fill in the ~bored~ bits of time that the children insist still occur no matter how jam packed our life seems to be.

Now me, I am never bored, in fact I could use some ~bored~. I have looked high and low for some but all I can seem to find is more things to clean or projects I want to do. Perhaps one can only see ~BORED~ with child eyes. In any case we shall have none of that here at the Crafty Homeschooler and we will be taking on our big and small projects with much joy and all the German Glass Glitter we can handle!

Our first project is courtesy of K&Company. These easy but elegant paper ornaments are just perfect for some Crafty Homeschooling. Multiple 3-dimensional shapes make wonderful examples for a quick lesson in geometric form. Victorian printed paper trapezoids, cones, parallelograms and more make up this easy to use crafting pad. All you really need to add is glue dots, or scrapbooking adhesive. You could always use old fashioned glue but this adds a considerable amount of frustration /drying time to projects that could go straight onto the tree or be used as gifts. The projects look great just how they are but do leave lots of room for creative embellishments with bits of sparkle and spice if that is your thing. I envision adding some vintage buttons and maybe some small jingle bells to make our season bright.

Crafty Homeschooler rating: Easy!

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