Make Your Own Crown

So, we’ve been a little Queen Esther-happy over here the past week. We’ve watched the movie every day (I’m not kidding) and talked about how brave she was. I am very happy with the letter Q!

I told you we were going to make crowns for our Q verse but…well, it’s been a long week. My sil is in town from Mexico and hanging out with 5 family members you don’t see except once a year kinda takes your time up.

But I’m going to share with you the crowns I found online and hopefully by the end of the day, someone in this house will be wearing a crown!

I love this one best. I found it at FamilyFun.com. It was made for 4th of July but if you switch the colors up, it’s a fun crown for boys or girls!

I do think this one is a little hard for preschoolers (it’s made out of duct tape, straws & pipe cleaners). An easier version would be to use that corrugated paper trim (that you put on bulletin boards) as the headpiece. Then just stick the pipecleaners inside the holes of the corrugated paper.

Now, if you own a sewing machine and can actually, you know, use it; you might like these little pretties…

I found this via the blogger formerly known as Kerflop, on her blog Balancing Everything. She’s got a great tutorial. And of course, I know a 2 year old couldn’t really make this craft, but woweee, would they love to wear it or what?!

(And if you don’t already know, you will soon come to understand I have an undying love for all things felt. So, if you’re feeling really crafty and felty, look at these cute crowns I found on flickr. To. die. for.)

The one I really want to make, I cannot find a good tutorial for. Or any tutorial for that matter. But I think it would be fun. Here’s the basic idea:

Collect the following:

• clear contact paper or clear packing tape
• random sparkly stuff (like sequins, confetti, etc.)

Next:

• Measure a length of contact paper/packing tape big enough to fit around your child’s head. (If you’re using contact paper, you could cut it into the shape of a crown.)
• Lay it sticky side up on the table.
• Allow child to sprinkle sparkly stuff on contact paper/tape
• Place another length of contact paper on top of your sparkly stuff. This will create a little sandwich of sparkly stuff.
• Trim to desired shape and length.
• Place around child’s head and attach with…velcro, tape, glue, string, etc.

I like this idea because of the clear & sparkly combo. Kind of a la Glenda, the Good Witch of the North.

Do you have any good crown ideas to share? I’d love to hear!

And I hope my little princess…er, Queen Esther enjoys making one of these! (Now, which of these items do I have at home right now?)

Impressive, no?

OK, these impressive puns could get old. But I gotta tell you, I’m impressed with my daughter.

Like I mentioned, we watched Veggie Tale’s Queen Esther dvd in honor of the letter Q this week. Lydia loves all things princess. So, I knew this movie was going to be right up her alley.

(sidenote: Even though I’ve always loved Veggie Tales, we haven’t been big Veggie Tales watchers because sometimes I think they are confusing for her when she doesn’t know the Bible story first. I mean, vegetables dressing up like the Wizard of Oz to tell a fractured version of The Wizard of Oz/The Prodigal Son? Even I get confused!)

Anyway, Lydia has fallen in love with Queen Esther. We’ve watched it at her request every day since! It is beating out JoJo’s Circus, so that’s saying something! (I sing JoJo’s theme song in my sleep!)

We’ve been talking about the show as much as possible because the underlying message is courage–being brave because God is there with you. Well, this is exactly what Lydia has needed to hear. She is very shy and timid. We’ve even had to do a little “discipline” because of her shy behavior (she can manipulate with it and will even pretend to be shy to her family, etc.) I know she is actually apprehensive about some situations, so we’re just a litte lost about what to do with it.

A few weeks ago I was telling my friend at church about her behavior and she said, “Has anyone ever told Lydia she was shy?” I said, “Uh yeah, like a few 100 times.” She said, “You need to tell her she’s brave. If someone says, ‘Oh, she’s shy.’ Say, ‘Oh, no! Lydia is brave!'” I literally slapped my forehead and said, “Why didn’t I think of that?!”

So, for about a week or two we’ve been talking about how Lydia is so brave. This morning, I walked by Lydia while she was eating breakfast and watching Queen Esther. She turned to me and said excitedly, “Esther is not going to be afraid!”

Which was the perfect segue to what we did this morning…Lydia was invited to a Bring A Friend day at a ballet class. I knew she’d love it but would also be a little shy. I didn’t want her melting down and refusing to come off my shoulder while the other girls played and danced. So we talked about how Lydia was going to be brave at ballet class.

Then after getting dressed and kissing Daddy good-bye, she said to me, “I’m going to be brave like Queen Esther!”

And look who had the best time at ballet—not one tear, no whining or clinging to Mommy:

Quite Possibly the World’s Most Perfect Q

We’re to Q. Q. What kind of letter is Q? It can’t even work on it’s own, it’s got to have a little “u” next to it. How random is that? Who made that rule up? It’s very strange to me much less a 2 year old.

I was a little stuck on a Q verse. The only one I could think of was “Quench not the Spirit.” 1 Thessalonians 5:19. King Jimmy anyone?  So, I emailed my bbb* (and one faithful commenter), Leigh. She got concordance- happy and sent me a great list of Q verses.

We chose:

“I am quick to obey your commands…” Psalm 119:32

That is definitely something I want my daughter, Lydia to be. Quick to obey. That’s one reason I named her Lydia because the Lydia in the Bible was quick to believe and do for God. However, when I explained that “quick” meant “fast”, she said, “Mommy, I don’t like fast.” Oh, well.

After a little starfall, and reading the verse, we decided to make a queen.. A beautiful, royal queen. I wanted it to just be her face with a little tinfoil crown. I mean, everyone has tinfoil in their cupboard, right?

WRONG!

So, on to Plan B. I looked through my wrapping paper until I found some silver ribbons. I found some pretty purple tissue paper with scalloped edges and voila, our queen:

OK, so Lydia put her lips on upside down. And she doesn’t have any limbs. And as Lydia pointed out, no chin, either. But still, she looks regal. Right?

I’m looking forward to this letter because I really want to tell Lydia the story of Queen Esther. One of my favorite kids’ Bibles, The Super Hero Bible is illustrated by Brother Jones Artwork. And their picture of Queen Esther is the best I’ve ever seen. I know she’ll love it when she sees it. Sorry I can’t show it to you… (FYI: I just went on amazon to link to it and it says it is OUT OF PRINT. If you ever find one at your bookstore, buy it. It’s way cool.)

Anyway, I think we’re also going to watch Veggie Tale’s Queen Esther. Even though it may be a little confusing when Lydia doesn’t even know the story to watch it with vegetables, but whatever. And of course, I’ve already promised Lydia we’ll be making Queen crowns. I found some really cute ones online yesterday. I’ll share them with you soon, I promise!

Oh, and keep your feed readers open, I’ve got a special announcement coming up ASAP!

*best blogging buddy