Salty Snowman

My little guy came home from speech class this morning full of talk of snowmen.  Snowmen are not something we see a lot of here in San Diego, but I guess they're working on their /sn/ blend sound and "snowman" fits the bill.  As we drove home I heard all about snowmen, and snowballs, and snowball fights and I had an idea for an art project.  (I swear every weekend I say I'm going to plan ahead for the week and get organised, have a plan of what to do with him every day etc etc - and every Monday morning I end up flying by the seat of my pants - again.  One day I truely will get a plan, get books that correspond with a theme, art & craft projects for every day, field trips to go with it all etc etc, until then, I'll be grateful for moments of inspiration, lol).

So here's how we made our Salty Snowman

What you need:
* white cardstock
* elmers glue
* paintbrush
* salt (with a spoon for sprinkling, or straight from the salt cellar)
* buttons, ribbon, odds & ends for decorating a snowman
* big piece of coloured paper
* pencil
* scissors



Painting the snowman with glue



1) First I drew a basic snowman shape on the white cardstock - just a big circle with a smaller circle on top.

2) I had the little guy paint the snowman with elmers glue (which he found amusing).

3) We added the googly eyes and counters (for buttons on the snowman's belly)

4) We sprinkled salt (by the spoonful - and more dumping than sprinkling.  Be aware, this is a MESSY step!) on the snowman



"Sprinkling" the snowman with salt



5) I shook the snowman to even out the salt a little, remove the salt covering his eyes (because someone was concerned that they were covered) and shake off the excess, and set him aside to dry a bit.



Salty snowman, drying



6) My little guy really wanted to decorate his big piece of paper - so he went to town with the elmers glue and the odds & ends pile.  He kept asking what everything was, showing me what he "found" and being very annoyed that the buttons with the sticky-outie bit at the back (what's the technical term??) wouldn't stick.

Decorating the background paper

7) After a little while I cut out the snowman, and the little guy glued him on to the paper. 

8) Add any last minute accessories - I decided the snowman needed a scarf, so I cut a little piece of ribbon for that, and I was instructed to cut out a hat too, because snowmen need hats!

9) I was pleased with this project for a number of reasons - it had the boy practicing his /sn/ blends a lot, there was a sensory stimulation with the salt, fine motor skills with the sticking of the eyes & buttons etc, as well as with the sprinkling of the salt.  And best of all, he had fun and made a cute snowman picture for me to hang on my wall!



The finished product - a Salty Snowman!


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