Tag Archives: kids

Like Bats on the Beach *

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The moon is bright, the bugs are out, the weather is perfect…for a bat beach party!

We reads Bats at the Beach by Brian Lies (Clarion Books, 2006). As night rises, a bevy of bats head to the shore for some sand, waves, snacks, and a moon tan. Clever, sweet, and filled with absolutely gorgeous illustrations (the moonlight shining through the bats’ wings!), this book is an extra charming read, any time of day.

Our story time project was inspired by this amazing flying bat craft by Raising Veggie Lovers that our friend Franny spotted on Pinterest and tagged Katie…

Their version is smaller and utilizes a free printable template and a drinking straw, but we wanted to make something a little larger for our program!

You’ll need:

  • Black poster board
  • 1 paper towel tube
  • Black construction paper
  • String
  • Scissors and tape for construction
  • Metallic markers for decorating
  • Hot glue
  • Optional: paper cup beach bucket

Here’s a bird’s eye view of our version of the project. First, cut your bat’s body out of black poster board (the wing span for our bat ended up being 21.5″). Fold the bat’s head upwards, then add eyes, a nose, and a smile with metallic markers. Wrap a paper towel tube in black construction paper, then hot glue it on top of the lower half of the bat’s body.

Above, you can see where we used tape (and black dot stickers) to attach two pieces of string to each bat wing (our strings were 27.5″ in length). Thread both strings through the length of the paper towel tube, then knot them together at the bottom. We also anchored the strings to a purple foam bead to make it easier for kids to grab. Your bat is complete! Pull the strings and watch the wings flap!

How about a beach bucket? Cut the sides of a paper cup about halfway down, leaving a strip on each side that fold together at the top to form the bucket’s handle. Color and cut the shells from this beach shell template and drop them in your bucket! Finish by hot gluing the bucket to the underside of your bat.

No beach night is complete without some activities and refreshments, so Katie and I turned out the gallery lights and let kids and their bats navigate to this lighthouse (yes, that is a spinning disco light):

And here I am staffing the bug juice bar where bats could order various flavors of juices (color cotton balls in little sample cups):

Meanwhile, Katie had the beach grill going with marshmallows. These were packing peanuts mounted on  craft sticks roasted over red holidays lights:

Deluxe bugmallows were also available…these were mallows with wings and legs added, very much like the ones depicted in the book. Sooooo CUTE.

* Yes, this is a Taylor Swift reference  

It’s Telescope Time!

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This week, our intern Melanie Zhang takes us to the stars with a simple telescope project with custom slides! You may remember Melanie’s superb honey cakes kitchen test this summer, followed by blueberry jam for Sal, and her guest appearance in our unique story time garden. Now it’s time to explore the galaxies…take it away Melanie!

I have for you a craft that is out of this world in more ways than one! I was inspired by Star Stuff: Carl Sagan and the Mysteries of the Cosmos written by Stephanie Roth Sisson (Roaring Brook Press, 2014). Star Stuff tells the story of Carl Sagan, astronomer and planetary scientist. He also once was just a young boy, looking up at the night sky, wondering about the stars. If you currently don’t have a starry night sky to look at, here’s how to make your own!

You’ll need:

  • Paper towel tube
  • Tin foil
  • Petri dish (or a clear plastic cup or plastic packaging)
  • Scissors, glue, and tape for construction
  • Stickers, construction paper, Sharpie markers, and masking tape for decorating
  • Small tissue box (optional)

First, take your paper towel tube and wrap it in a piece of tin-foil. Tape in place and fold the excess foil around the top and bottom edges of the tube. Next, decorate your telescope however you would like! I chose to wrap extra strips of folded tin-foil as well as construction paper around the top and bottom, then add stickers and label my telescope the “SKYSPOTTER 9000” with a sharpie. Now you have your telescope!

Next up is the night sky! Grab your petri dish and open it up. Using sharpies—other markers won’t color properly on the plastic—draw your space scene on the inside of both the dish and the lid. You can draw a constellation, like the big dipper, or planets, or shooting stars.

If you don’t have a petri dish, you can use the bottom of a clear plastic cup, or just about any piece of clear, flat plastic. For example, I used a plastic takeout box from lunch and cut a circle of plastic out of the lid.

It helps to draw your space scene on top of a white sheet of paper so it’s easier to see what you’re doing. Or, you can instead draw on a piece of masking tape, then cut out your drawing and paste it onto your petri dish! Just make sure that the tape you’re using is translucent and light can still shine through.

Hold your telescope up in front of one eye, then hold the petri dish up behind it, ideally in front of a light source. Take a look at what you see! Hold the petri dish closer or further away from the telescope to zoom in and out, or move it around to see all the different parts of your space scene.

Optionally, you can make your telescope a place to rest out of a tissue box! To make a telescope stand, cut a wide slot into your tissue box, wide enough for your telescope to fit in. You’ll want to cut the slot so that it extends further down on one side of the box than the other wise, so that when you set your telescope down, it is still aimed up at the sky. Keep your petri dishes inside of the box to keep them safe!

I also added a foam sticker to the underside of my telescope, near the bottom end, so that when I put it on its stand, it will stay in place. You could also tape on an extra piece of foil or a roll of paper.

And we’re done! Do you think “STARSPOTTER” or “SKYSPOTTER” has a better ring to it?

Pretty Poisonous Posies

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It’s perhaps one of our most spectacular story times yet! Not only did kids get to craft the poison garden of their dreams, they got to visit a very mysterious garden in the library, and meet two very special guests!

We read Millie Fleur’s Poison Garden by Christy Mandlin (Orchard Books, 2024). When Millie Fleur La Fae and her mother move to Garden Glen, they quickly discover that the community appreciates sameness, right down to the prim matching hedges. It does not appreciate the unusual, odd, creepy, and (sometimes) poisonous plants in Millie’s garden. Ignoring the negativity, Millie invites her classmates to explore the wonderful weirdness of her garden. As more and more people show up for a tour, quirky new plants pop up around the neighborhood, making it a special place for all. Fun fact: the author was inspired to write the book after she learned of the famous Poison Garden in Alnwick Castle in England. Make sure to read all about it at the end of the book!

You’ll need:

  • 1 box (we used a 4″ x 4″ x 4″ craft box, but a small tissue box works too!)
  • 1 poison garden plant template, printed on 8.5″ x 11″ card stock
  • Drinking straws, pipe cleaners, and/or twisteez wire
  • Brown tissue paper (or paper towels)
  • Scissors and tape for construction
  • Markers for decorating

This is a very simple project with lots of room for creativity. Cut the top off of a small box, then color and cut the various plants from the template. Tape them to pipe cleaners, drinking straws, or Twisteez wire, then tuck everything inside the box. Add some brown tissue paper (or brown paper towels) as “soil” to anchor everything down. Done!

Kids were also free to improvise plants of their own! We offered toilet paper tubes, construction paper, muffin cups, fabric leaves, pom-poms, and packing peanuts as well. And lots and lots of eye stickers to ramp up the spooky factor and replicate the illustrations in the book.

We also had a special side projects for caregivers…we gave them envelope “seed packets” and a blank card, and they were free to write all the things that make their little one unique. Awwww!

Everyone was delighted with their little gardens, but we had a BIG surprise ready. An entire garden tour with Millie herself. Yes, that’s our summer intern Melanie Zhang in all her awesomeness!

We spent the week building a garden in an empty back office using leftover supplies from this Hobbit event, any and all foliage on our desks, twinkle lights, LED candles, and some weird cardboard monster blocks I picked up at a yard sale for $5.

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I did say there were two special guests at the beginning of the post. Melanie was one guest, and her frog Harold was the second! In the book, Millie has a pet frog, so Melanie brought in her special buddy for kids to find in the garden. She knitted him that handsome scarf as well. Look closely and you can see him in various photos in the post!

We would like to thank Melanie (and Harold) for brainstorming, creating, crafting and guest starring at this story time. It was completely magical – and so are you Melanie!