My Little Pony Decorations: The Cutie Clouds

Zoey and I needed decorations for her 4th Birthday party and I wanted to use items I have on-hand to make them. We spent an entire month crafting decorations together.  Since we had recently moved into a new house and had a ton of cardboard boxes hanging around, we used them to make My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic "Cutie Clouds."

This was really fun to do with my two older kids. I really lucked out on this project since the kids were actually working well together. If my littlest one had been awake, she probably would have tried eating the paint and crawling all over the clouds while they were still wet... it would have been rather stressful. Thank heavens for nap time.

 Things You'll Need

• A few large cardboard boxes 
• Markers, crayons, stickers...
• Paint (I used leftover house paint)
• A knife (I used a serrated carving knife)
• Paint Brushes
• A tarp (maybe)

Directions

(in case you can't tell from just looking at them ;-p)

1. Pick a place to set up. Use the tarp if you are planning to paint with the kids and you need to keep things clean.
2. Give your kid(s) a cardboard box, pencils, markers, crayons, stickers... whatever you have on hand and let them begin to decorate and play with their box.
3. Draw clouds on the sides of the boxes. (I used Google to find images of clouds from the show, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic) 
4.  Use the serrated knife to cut the clouds out.
5. Get to painting! To start, paint each cloud one color or let the kids paint and just follow their lead! CAUTION: let's be honest here, painting projects with little ones will likely involve fighting over who uses what color or brush... so make sure you are in a good mood and energetic before you even THINK about doing this.
6. Once the clouds are all painted and have dried, paint the swirls on them and your done!

 I intended to hang these from the branches of our cherry tree for the party. Unfortunately the weather didn't cooperate. So I used them as decoration inside instead. (I don't have a picture of this...sorry.)

So... what did I do with the clouds AFTER the party??? I hung them in the playroom. They go nicely with the Twilight Sparkle I drew on the wall last winter. Then, I used them as decoration in the living room when we threw our My Little Pony: Season Four Premier Party . And I'm sure I'll find even more uses for them in the future.