Last year we read the story of The Cobweb Christmas and then made a simple craft with the kids.
This year we got The Cobweb Curtain from the library. It is the story of the Holy Family's flight into Egypt and the spider that consealed them from soldiers as they hid in a cave. It is a great story that we all enjoyed.
After reading, we looked back at the spider webs we made last year and Mark remembered reading about how to make a spider web from the book 100 Things You Should Know About Insects and Spiders.
We tried to follow the directions...
We taped down the straight strings to begin the web. This went fine,
then things got way too messy and a little too difficult for a mother and 4 children under the age of 9 to do. You are supposed to dip the string into the glitter glue and then place it in a circular pattern around the web. This sounded easy--it stuck to everything, our fingers, the table, hair, and small children.
I stopped this technique and used a toothpick to spread the glue where I wanted it. (I should have just squirted the glue out of the bottle, but it was in a bowl because we put the string into it at first.) This way it was easy to place the string onto the cardboard using the plastic end of a paintbrush. After the string was down, I used clear "school glue" to cover the strings some more so that when it dried it would be very secure.
The next day, I was able to take the tape off the cardboard circle and trim the stiffened string. I then let the littlest among us paint over the whole web to give it more sparkle. We used my new favorite glittery glue paint.
It is so nice and shimmery. It would be much prettier if we had painted the cardboard black. (Maybe next time.) You can't really tell from the picture how is shines. We trimmed it and added a paper clip for hanging. I wasn't really going to put it on the Christmas tree, but Mark insisted, remember, it was his craft idea. In fact, it goes quite nicely on our almost totally homemade tree. In this picture you can see part of a borax snowflake, a popcorn string, a paper chain, pipe cleaners with pony beads and part of a handsewn ornament--very child friendly!
We tried to follow the directions...
We taped down the straight strings to begin the web. This went fine,
then things got way too messy and a little too difficult for a mother and 4 children under the age of 9 to do. You are supposed to dip the string into the glitter glue and then place it in a circular pattern around the web. This sounded easy--it stuck to everything, our fingers, the table, hair, and small children.
I stopped this technique and used a toothpick to spread the glue where I wanted it. (I should have just squirted the glue out of the bottle, but it was in a bowl because we put the string into it at first.) This way it was easy to place the string onto the cardboard using the plastic end of a paintbrush. After the string was down, I used clear "school glue" to cover the strings some more so that when it dried it would be very secure.
The next day, I was able to take the tape off the cardboard circle and trim the stiffened string. I then let the littlest among us paint over the whole web to give it more sparkle. We used my new favorite glittery glue paint.
It is so nice and shimmery. It would be much prettier if we had painted the cardboard black. (Maybe next time.) You can't really tell from the picture how is shines. We trimmed it and added a paper clip for hanging. I wasn't really going to put it on the Christmas tree, but Mark insisted, remember, it was his craft idea. In fact, it goes quite nicely on our almost totally homemade tree. In this picture you can see part of a borax snowflake, a popcorn string, a paper chain, pipe cleaners with pony beads and part of a handsewn ornament--very child friendly! 
4 comments:
Very cute project.
BTW--I love your new header picture. You have a beautiful family:)
Your banner is beautiful!
I declare you "Supermom"! :)
Enjoyed seeing the craft. I love this little story.
Wonderful banner and great craft!
Neat, Joann! We read the little old lady folktale last year and made a spiderweb tree, but, like you guys *&:O) found the story of the spider at the Nativity this year. We liked it way better!
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