Jack & The Beanstalk

Jack and the Beanstalk is, by far, the fairy tale that has most intrigued our boys.  During the past month they have asked me to read it all most every day and, on their own, they started to act out the story - "fee fi fo fum" has become a common phrase in our house. I decided to focus their passion into a little crafting - no surprise there - and we created our own Jack and the Beanstalk scene. 

staring Robin as Jack and a Green Lantern as the Giant

Since this project developed over several days I don't have a picture of all our supplies but here is a list.

boot box

wrapping paper tube

green and blue paint

paint brushes

green construction paper

scissors

green glitter glue

hole puncher

pipe cleaners

60 popsicle sticks

tape

white glue

glue gun

cotton balls

easter grass

We started by using our dish-wands to paint a wrapping paper tube green.

Then we painted the inside of a boot box blue 

I drew leaf shapes onto green construction paper and then Big Buddy and I worked together to cut them all out. 

Then we used green glitter-glue to add detail to the leaves.

After the glue dried, I punched a hole in each leaf and then Big Buddy strung the leaves onto pipe cleaners. 

I also used the hole punch to make holes at the top and bottom of the tube where we knotted pipe cleaners. We then twisted the pipe cleaners around the tube connecting them to each other as we went.

Once the tube was finished we used an ex-acto knife to cut a hole out of the top of the boot box and dropped the tube through it. I also hot glued the bottom of the tube to the bottom of the box. 

Then Big Buddy and I followed the directions in this video to build a simple craft stick castle for the giant. 

After the castle was finished, I hot glued it to the top of the box.  For our final step, the boys used white glue to add cotton ball clouds to the top of the box and easter grass to the bottom. 

finished!

mini man acting out the story
"fee fi fo fum i smell the blood of an english muffin!"

 While waiting for parts of our castle to dry we also played with some beans.

we sorted them

big buddy decided they were dinosaur eggs 

we were going to use them to spell our names but
the boys wanted to spell super hero names instead

big buddy once again not quite understanding
mini man's "mess" :) 

The main reason I had bought the beans was to do a little science experiment (similar to this one) and see if we could grown our own "bean stalks".  Big Buddy needed some convincing before we started - he was adamant that he did not want to see a giant. He really had no need to worry, because before our beans could sprout, Little Lady discovered them and had herself a small snack - I think her and Mini Man will grow to be great friends.