We found a cute craft in FamilyFun Magazine this month: a Mermaid Wand. I have no idea why a mermaid would need a wand. But it’s a craft with shells and sand, so we made it!

Not only that it goes perfectly with the scripture we’re studying this week from Psalm 139:

God, your thoughts about me are priceless.
No one can possibly add them all up.
If I could count them,
they would be more than the grains of sand.
(verse 17 & 18, NIrV)

This has always been one of my favorite verses and I thought the whole chapter would be a good one for us to talk about and investigate a little.

As we started making our mermaid wands, I remembered that I wanted to take pictures so I could post a little tutorial for you. So, I asked Lydia to get my camera. Lo and behold, the battery is dead! And I thought about stopping the kids so I could charge my battery or plug in the camera. But I felt bad that we couldn’t even have a singular fun activity without me having to chronicle it for my blog! As if everything we do is really for Impress Your Kids and not really because I want to impress my kids!

I put SEO, traffic and comments out of my mind, set the camera down and just made a craft with the kids. So, now you’ll have to imagine the fun we had today, ok? I’ll give you some prompts to help out! (And you can look at the photo above…taken when the kids were napping today for help!)

[insert photo of me cutting cardboard with an xacto knife]

First we cut out shapes from cardboard. FamilyFun shows a star (and says you can use their template). I made my own template with my handy dandy cut-a-star-tutorial. Lydia wanted a heart on her wand.

[insert photo of Asa wiping glue on his shirt]

Then we spread glue (with our fingers) all over our cardboard shapes!

[insert photo of Lydia and Asa with both hands in the sandbox]

Next we poured sand all over our gluey cardboard. This was quite fun and very messy!

[insert photo of glue hearts and stars]

After we got the first layer of sand on our cardboard, we drew shapes with glue. Then poured more sand over that to make a 3d effect!

[insert photo of Lydia and Asa meticulously sorting through shells]

Then I fished out a bag of shells I bought for Asa’s pirate party but never used. We glued those to our shapes and left them to dry.

Now all we have to do is stick a dowel rod (or bamboo skewer) in the cardboard and we’re done!

[insert photo of Lydia counting sand grains on her finger]

While we made these we read Psalm 139:17-18 several times. We even tried to count all the grains of sand on our fingers. Then we discussed how much sand was in our little sand box–if God even thought about us as many times a day as there are grains of sand IN OUR SANDBOX it would be a lot! Much less the beach or the whole world!

It was a very fun activity that had a very tangible message. I pray my children always rest in, recognize and realize the great love and care God has for them!

Oh and one more photo…[insert photo of me plugging in my camera!]

ps–I’ve got another Psalm-139 centric post this week which includes a FUN giveaway!

My first summer camp was in 3rd grade. My last summer camp was the year I married. Camp is one of my best and favorite memories. And it’s a big deal in my family–my mom is a camp director for Camp Rocks, while my dad, brother, sister-in-law and cousin all volunteer at it. Lydia is chomping at hte bits to be old enough to attend.

This year, while the family was at camp, Lydia and I decided to make a special camp necklace to deliver to our camping family on the last day. We made S’mores Necklaces! Aren’t they the cutest thing you’ve ever seen?! It’s as easy as it looks–just string them together and wear! But I’ll show you some of the things we learned along the way…

Supplies: dark brown craft foam, light brown craft foam, paper clips, string for necklace, scissors and Foam Marshmallows

1. Cut out 2 identical squares of the light brown foam. These are your graham crackers! Cut out a smaller square from the dark brown foam. This is the chocolate!

2. Flatten out a paper clip leaving the smaller end intact. (I tried using a quilting needle and just stringing them all together. I couldn’t get it–maybe my string was too fat or my needle too skinny. Paperclips are more my style anyway!)

3. Stack your chocolate on top of one graham cracker. Then poke your paperclip through the bottom! If you do this out of order, your chocolate will be underneath or above the marshmallow and you won’t be able to see it.

4. (Yikes! Sorry about that crazy focus job!) Now, fold down the paperclip to be flush with the craft foam. It makes a nice little clamp that keeps everything from slipping off!

5. Then slide on your marshmallow (through the equator, not the north/south poles!) and your final piece of graham cracker!

6. Now twist that paper clip into a little circle and add a string!

We delivered them to my family this morning and everyone loved them! My mom said a bunch of kids asked her, “Where’d you get that S’mores necklace?!” I wanted to add a little tag to it that said, “You’re loved S’MORE than you know!” Or something like that. Maybe next time!

Have you been to summer camp? Do your kids go? What’s your favorite part—besides the s’mores, of course?

While you’re thinking about camp–here’s some of our favorite summer camp posts!

linked to childmade.com

The kids and I found a turtle in our backyard on Friday. They were so excited that it turned our whole day into a turtle day. We watched the turtle, looked at him with a magnifying glass, looked up stuff about turtles on the internet, printed off turtle worksheets and finally decided to make a turtle craft–a cute turtle necklace! {I found this on another website which I cannot find again but if I do, I’ll link back to them!}

All you need is some yarn, beads, craft foam cut into the shape of a turtle (the template was on the website & I can’t find it!), hole punch, glue gun, scissors, paint & some plastic bottle tops.

We painted our bottle tops brown and made yellow spots. Well, Lydia did one giant spot. It was a box turtle & really, she looked just like the ones the kids painted! By the way, did I tell you they named her Daisy?

While the bottle tops are drying, cut out a little turtle shape and punch a hole in his front feet (paws? hands?).

Then string a piece of yarn through the holes and add a few beads. Asa loves stringing beads so this was a fun one for him!

When your beads are on, grab your hot glue gun and attach the new bottle cap turtle shell. (You can see Asa’s spots on that one!)

And that’s it! Tie it up and throw it around your neck–turtle necklace! Isn’t it cute?

As we beaded and painted I read all of Psalm 7. It’s a rough one about how David is about to be torn apart by his enemies like a lion tears apart his prey. But verse 10 is the one I wanted them to hear:

The Most High God is like a shield that keeps me safe.

“The Most High” is something our family talks about a lot. My dad’s favorite passage is Psalm 91. It’s kept us leaning on God through cancer, chemo, surgery and Hepatitis C treatments. And Lydia and I just had a big conversation in the car about dwelling in the shelter of the Most High. So, this verse is a perfect add on to Psalm 91′s focus of The Most High.

And the shield? Well, it reminded us of our little turtle shells! A shield protects just like a turtle shell! I had the kids repeat the verse several times and I really wanted to make a giant paper mache shield to write the verse on—but alas, we didn’t have any newspaper. Oh, well. Some other time!

But the point remains–the turtle reminds us of God’s protection in our life. The Most High our very own shield!