same old same old

I really don't have anything new or excititng to update here. We are still plugging along, trying to at least come together at the dinner table each evening. Sometimes that means eating dinner at 9pm, like last night. I hate doing that but it happens.

Right now I am taking 'Music for Young Children' as one of my classes. We were supposed to make an instrument and I couldn't decide between a rainstick and sandpaper blocks so I made both. I've got pictrues of the process here but no real final outcome shots. Sorry, brain fart. And I don't really care for how blogger.com works because it adds the pictures in backwards order of what I put them in as, so you have to start from the bottom picture and work your way up.








4. Spray painted, usually a favorite part of any project, but I really had to get in there and around the handles so it was a little tricky. Also, lesson learned... don't use this kind of spray paint without sealing it before you use it. It will make your hands gold. After they were dry, i hot glued on the sandpaper and they were ready to go. My kids (daycare and my own) love these too.
3. screwed on the handle. We went back and countersunk the screws so the sandpaper would be flush with the block.

2. Drilled holes in the center

1. Here is the start of my sandpaper blocks.

3. See the inside is full of nails. Doesn't really look like a preschool toy does it!? this is the last photo I have of the rain stick. Just picture it filled with marbles and dried corn, capped off on the ends, wrapped in colorful wrapping paper, and then covered with contact paper. Kids love it!

2. Strategically placed drill holes with nails in them. Maya drilled almost all of these holes.

1. Rainstick started with a piece of PVC pipe.

That's all for now.