"Handy" Little Butterflies

A finished handy butterfly stapled to the 
bulletin board in my classroom.

       These little butterflies made with magic markers and construction paper sure come in handy when you need a quick way to decorate your classroom for spring! Little ones can also learn the parts of a butterfly while crafting their butterflies. 

       Students can learn about patterns and colors with this assignment. First they will need to fold a white sheet of paper in half twice and fill in each of the four spaces with patterns of shapes and colors of particular selection. After they have completed this step, students will then need to trace around their hands four times within each square of their designed paper. Cut these hands out to form the wings of your butterflies. I stapled their wings to some simple shapes of a butterfly's thorax cut from black construction paper. You can also add a few chenille stems for antennae. 

       My kindergarteners were so proud of their creations. What seems to be old-fashioned to us is  always entertaining to five year olds. It is one of the many blessings of being new to the world. Every little innocent thing holds some fascination for the very young. 

       Many of these butterflies did not make it to the bulletin board. My kindergarteners loved this butterfly craft so much, they tried to sneak their paper butterflies home! I saw them, however, stuffing their new friends into their backpacks before I could collect all of my bulletin board trim! I stapled the butterflies all over my display areas after students finished this art project. What an easy fun way to fill up bulletin boards!

Supply List:

• white drawing paper
• magic markers
• black construction paper
• white school glue or stapler
• one black chenille stem per butterfly

Left, color patterns on drawing paper. Center, trace around child hands for the wings. Right,
glue or staple on black butterfly body and black chenille stems for antenna.

Step-by-Step Instructions:

1. Fold a sheet of white drawing paper in half and then in half again. Unfold it; now your student will have four spaces to draw four different patterns with a set of magic markers.
2. Once students have completed their patterns, have them trace around their hands four times and cut out the four hand tracings to attach to their butterfly bodies.
3. Fold a small, narrow length of black construction paper in half and cut out a simple butterfly shaped body for it.
4. Glue or staple the handy wings to it. 
5. Cut one black chenille stem in half.
6. Twist one end on each half into a little ''c'' shaped loop.
7. Glue the opposite ends to the top of the handy butterfly to make antenna.

Make a Lenten Card Featuring Palms

Lenten cards in the traditional season's colors: purple and green.

       These cards for Lent feature simple, palm leaf motifs cut from green papers layered on top of both purple and beige patterned, acid free papers. The scripture and palm leaf graphic may be downloaded and printed from The Christian Clip Art Review for this card. Use the illustrations at this blog for non-profit, personal crafts only, if you are not fund raising for your church.

       The scripture reference reads, "And all things that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of Man shall be accomplished. ....And they understood none of these things." Luke 18: 31-34

The following poem may be included with the card, it is in the public domain:

by S. D. Gardner

And this is life -- to-day we here abide,

Perchance to-morrow we must step aside,

We master not our own; no vain regret

Can change the path for us which God has 

set.

Then let our footsteps be toward the light,

With loving words and deeds make each day

bright.

Let charity progress to wider plan,

Lend gracious ear to creed of every man. 

A close-up look at the Palm Sunday themed card.

Make Christian Cross Cards

"And he that takes not his cross, and follows after me, is not worthy of me." 

 Matthew 10:38 

      This card illustrates classic, simple lines; a hand-crafted yet formal card excellent for announcements, “Thank You” notes or sentimental letters. I outlined this simple cross clip art with a metallic, silver ink pen. Then I pasted the cross to a variety of layered parchment papers, cutting each consecutive paper slightly larger with every new pasting.

Quotes:

• “The world takes us to a silver screen on which flickering images of passion and romance play, and as we watch, the world says, “This is love.” God takes us to the foot of a tree on which a naked and bloodied man hangs and says, “This is love.” Joshua Harris
• “We sinned for no reason but an incomprehensible lack of love, and He saved us for no reason but an incomprehensible excess of love.” Peter Kreeft
• “Christ is sufficient. We do not need "support groups" for each and every separate tribulation. The most widely divergent sorrows may all be taken to the foot of the same old rugged cross and find there cleansing, peace, and joy.”  Elisabeth Elliot

Illustration:    The cross of Jesus Christ was to the Greeks foolishness and a stumbling-block of the Jews. They could not see its meaning; just as I have walked out on the porch of a north Georgia home two hours before day, and in the dim starlight I could see only the faint outline of mountain and hill. I could not tell what they were. It was an indistinct picture that had in it no meaning to me. I have gone back to my room and after a while have walked out on the porch again. The sun had risen on the scene and bathed hill and mountain and valley in a flood of light, and then I looked and saw hills and mountains and valleys and streams that mine eyes had never seen before.-- "Famous Stories of Sam P. Jones."

My Christian cross graphic with
 a crackled surface pattern.
Click on image to download
larger size.

Mission Quilts and Kits for Lutheran World Relief

         Every year Lutherans across the U.S. sew quilts and assemble kits of supplies that LWR sends to partners around the world that request them to meet the needs of people affected by poverty and disaster.

       Mission Quilts were one of the earliest forms of aid that Lutherans sent through LWR to reach out to people in other parts of the world. In 2016, LWR sent $14 million worth of quilts and kits to more than 576,000 people in 21 different countries.

• Get instructions for the making of quilts for Lutheran World Relief

      There are five kinds of LWR Kits:

1. LWR Personal Care Kits contain items like toothbrushes, wash cloths, and soap, intended to help a person or family maintain hygiene practices. 
2. LWR School Kits contain notebooks, pencils, erasers, a backpack, and other items to use for students to attend school. 
3. LWR Baby Care Kits contain T-shirts, cloth diapers, and other items to care for a baby. 
4. LWR Fabric Kits contain fabric, thread, and needles so that people can learn to sew, potentially to earn an income.
5. Covid 19 Defense Kits contain items like face masks, essential hygiene items and self care supplies.

       In 2013, LWR joined the United Nations Humanitarian Resource Depot, which allowed it to pre-position quilts and kits in depots across the world for rapid deployment after an emergency.

Nature And Man

       Come  with  me  to  the  Yosemite   Valley;  yonder  stands  El  Capitan - the   atmosphere  so  clear,  it  seems   as   though  you  might  strike it  with  a  stone.     Approach  nearer;  how  it   looms   up;  how  it  grows and  widens;  how  grand!     See  yonder   those  shrubs  in  the  crevice - shrubs?     They  are  trees,  a  hundred  feet  in  height,  three  feet  and more  in  diameter.     Do   you   see  that   bend  in  the  face  of  the  rock? That  is  a  fissure,  75  feet  wide.     Nearer  yet,  still  nearer.     It  seems  as if  you  might  touch  it  now  with  your  finger.      Stand  still  under  the shadow  of  El  Capitan.     A   plumb   line  from   the  summit  falls  fifty feet  from  the  base.     Now  look  up,  up,  up,  3,600  feet - two-thirds  of a  mile ‚Äî right  up.     How  grand  and  sublime!    Your  lips  quiver,  your nerves  thrill,  your  eyes  fill  with  tears,  and  you  understand   in  some degree  your  own  littleness.     "The  inhabitants  of  the  earth  are  but as  grasshoppers."     How  small  I  am!     I  could  not  climb  up  fifty  feet on  the  face  of  that  rock,  and  there  it   towers  above  me.      Yonder  is the  great  South  Dome,  rising  sheer  up  6,000  feet - more  than  a  mile, seamed  and  seared  by  the  storms  of  ages,  but  anchored  in  the  valley beneath.     There  are  the  Three  Brothers,   there   the   Cathedral  rocks and  spires,  there  the  Sentinel  Dome   and   the  Sentinel  Rock.     How magnificent!      See   yonder   the   wonderful   Yosemite  Falls  leaping through  a  gorge  eighteen  feet  before  it  strikes,  coming  down  like  sky-rockets, exploding  as  they  fall;  striking,  it  leaps  400  feet,  and  again it  leaps  600  feet.   More  than  half  a  mile the  water  pours  over.   What a  dash,  what  a  magnificent  anthem  ascending  to  the  great  Creator! Now  look  around  you  in  every  direction,  and  you  feel  the  littleness  of man.  Oh!  I  am  but  as  the  dust  in  the  balance,  but  as  the  small  dust in  the  balance;  but  God  created  man  in  His  own  image,  and  breathed into  his  nostrils  the  breath  of  life,  and  made  him - not  gave  him - but  made  him  a  living  soul;  therefore  I  am  a  man,  a  living  man,  but  that is  a  dead  rock.  I  am  a  living  man.  The  elements  shall  melt  with fervent  heat,  the  world  be  removed  like  a  cottage,  the  milky  way  shall shut  its  two  awful  arms  and  hush  its  dumb  prayer  forever,  but  I  shall live,  for  I  am  a  man  with  the  fire  of  God  in  me  and  a  spark  of  immortality that  will  never  go  out.  The  universe,  grand  and  magnificent and  sublime  as  it  is,  is  but  the  nursery  to  man's  infant  soul,  and  the child  is  worth  more  than  the  nursery;  therefore,  I,  a  living,  breathing, thinking,  hoping  man,  with  a  reason  capable  of  understanding,  in some  degree,  the  greatness  of  the  Almighty,  a  mind  capable  of  eternal development,  and  a  heart  capable  of  loving  Him,  am  worth  more than  all  God's  material  universe,  for  I  am  a man  with  a  destiny  before me  as  high  as  heaven  and  as  vast  as  eternity. John B. Gough.

(Yosemite National Park and Hymn by RadiantTV)

With  other  ministrations  thou,  O  Nature!
Healest  thy  wandering  and  distempered  child:
Thou  pourest  on  him  thy  soft  influences,
Thy  sunny  hues,  fair  forms,  and  breathing  sweets, -
Thy  melodies  of  woods,  and  winds,  and  waters
Till  he  relent,  and  can  no  more  endure
To  be  a  jarring  and  a  dissonant  thing
Amid  this  general  dance  and  minstrelsy;
But,  bursting  into  tears,  wins  back  his  way,
His  angry  spirit  healed  and  harmonized
By  the  benignant  touch  of  love  and  beauty.

by Samuel  Taylor  Coleridge.