Craft for Canada Day! (which would work for the Fourth, come to that)

It’s Canada Day, celebrating the one hundredth and … um… 2008 less 1867 is … 141, yeah, that’s it! One hundred forthy-one years of Confederation. When I am NOT, in fact, working. The tots are safe home with their parents, doing whatever it is parents of toddlers do when they’re at home with them.

The post you are reading now was written yesterday, after the children got back from the beach, 17 minutes before the clouds rolled furiously in and 23 minutes before it began to rain. Timing, or what? AND after the children had all been popped efficiently into bed, where they collapsed into smiling little bundles of damp disheveled cuteness, from whence they would pop in a couple of hours leaving a momento dusting of grit in their wake. This is one of the many reasons why they sleep ON rather than IN my family’s beds, with their own, personal bedding.

So, while they snooze, I peruse. Scan the craft cabinet, seeking inspiration. We could do the tried-and-true handprint flag, which already graces the front door of many of my neighbours’ homes. We do them most years, and that’s all right. It’s not like they remember, and even if they did it last year their hand has changed size so enormously their parents will love to compare.

But, no. Mary wants something different, something original, something not-paint. So she peruses the drawers before her, waiting for inspiration.

And it hits! Yes! Because what does everyone* in Ottawa do on Canada Day? Ha.

So here we have the raw materials:

Tin foil, pipe cleaners, star-shaped beads, and pink ribbon. I will cut the pipe cleaners in half, and cut the ribbon into, oh, 30- or 45-cm lengths. Then I will twist the pipe cleaners together in the centre, cut some sparkly shapes out of the tin foil… slide on some beads … attach the ribbons and curl them …twist and curl the pipe cleaners a bit … and …

TA-DAH!!! Imagine a child bouncing this around at the end of his/her arm.
Know what you’re looking at?
(Besides all the DUST on Mary’s desk? Good LORD who knew that was there? Damned flash.)
Still no idea? Have a peek from a different angle:

…from which angle you now also get to see the greasy fingerprints. Which are NOT mine. However, I will ignore that for now, and you can, too. I will get out the all-purpose spray cleanser later.

Still no idea?

Hint: On Canada Day (and Victoria Day, and, for those of you to the south, the Fourth of July), what does everybody* do, everybody* go see?

Fireworks, of course!

Those are fireworks! Red and white Canada Day fireworks, sparkling and sproinging right there in your hand!

The kids will LOVE them. And if they don’t, I’ll keep theirs, too. Because I think these are adorable.

*Everybody except me. Are you kidding me? They don’t even start until ten p.m! Every year, I hear them, boom, buh-boom, boom, in the distance. They generally wake me up.