Kevin and Amy do freezer paper stencilling

Kevin and I had a go at freezer paper stencilling on the weekend. There are tutorials all over the internet, I like this one.

I used this dino ride picture from a paper cutting blog that I came across a while ago. I love this silhouette and feel like I want to put it everywhere!


And Kevin used a T rex picture that we found by using google images.

The Dino Puppet Pattern and Tutorial

I have a pattern uploaded and a tutorial made for that dino puppet I created for Henry a few weeks ago. It is a simple hand puppet that you can make talk. It is sized for an adult hand.

Click here to download the pattern.   Sorry I have lost track of the pattern.

And here is a little tutorial to explain how to make it.

You need just around a quarter yard of material but you'll want at least a different colour for the teeth. I like to use felt because it's a nice stiffness. Part of what makes it look like a dinosaur is the poof of the head so you need something a bit stiff.

So step one download and print the pattern pieces. They are very simple and there is lots of room for error so you could definitely look at the pieces and just approximate them.


First pin the top of the head to the main head piece like so:


And sew:


Next pin the throat to the main head piece:


Try to make the bottom jaw approrimately the same size as the top jaw (have the same amount of orange between the brown on top and bottom like in the below picture).

Sew the throat piece to the main head piece and you should have something like this:

Now pin the mouth pieces into the open mouth area. Try to fill the space that is naturally created without stretching it out. If you have to cut away some excess mouth that is ok.


The mouth piece that you cut in half should be on top of the other mouth piece while it's in this inside out state.

Sew the mouth piece on. You'll turn at the corners of the mouth. This is a good time not to worry about little imperfections like bunching.

All sewed up:


And turn it inside out and you'll have something like this:


Now just hand sew on the teeth. Be sure to line up the two front teeth with the front of the mouth. And sew some buttons on for eyes. I like to use a thick thread like embroidery floss in a colour that contrasts the button to create pupils. And Voila! Loads of fun!

Henry's Second Chair: a dino chair

I finished Henry's second chair that I've been planning since I was about half done his first chair. I'm pretty darn proud of it, in fact I think it turned out awesome! I should mention Kevin drew the dinosaur for me.


Like the first chair, it is made of 2x4s, about $3 worth of them. Except the dinosaur was cut out of some pine that I still had left over from when I would take the scraps home from carpentry school. But unlike the first chair there is not a single screw or nail showing. (Screws hold the seat on but they are only visible from underneath.) Everything else is attached by biscuits or dowels or just 'routered' out spaces and glue. It was really fun figuring that all out and putting it together like a puzzle. I am already thinking about making the next one with a squirrel instead of the dino and leaving it unpainted and after that maybe experimenting with an upholstered chair. Such fun!

Dino Puppet

Henry has been LOVING the puppets in his Baby Einstein Video so I wanted to make a real puppet for him. After scouring the internet and the library I could not find a single free sewing pattern for a puppet so I had to come up with my own.

I managed to make one that turned out pretty well first try I think. And it ended up looking like a dinosaur so I decided to make it a dinosaur. It was really simple to make once I had the pattern figured out. I would like to upload the pattern on here as a contribution to the craft blogging community but not sure if there's an easy way to do that.

Henry likes his new puppet but not as much as the ones in Baby Einstein.