Octopi & Mountain Climbing

Orson is finally old enough to enjoy crafting and cute food! Thursday Orson was interested in some toilet paper rolls that I recently put aside for crafts, so I thought it was a good time to make an octopus like I saw here.

I told him to color the roll all over with markers, but he only added a few scribbles (and he normally loves to color!). I added the legs anyway to get him more excited ~ you just cut about halfway up on two sides, then repeat halfway between those cuts two more times to make 8 legs, wrapping them around your finger to curl them up. I also popped on some google eyes, which he hadn't seen yet, and he loved the octopus but constantly wanted to pull those eyes off! I'm sure we'll make more of these in the future.



At lunch I was thinking of making him a hot dog, and remembered those could make an easy octopus too! I basically made them like this, but used half a hot dog for each octopi. I knew the legs would separate if you boil them, but was happy to see it worked well in the microwave too!



I cut in some faces too, but those ended up a little creepy looking! You could draw faces on with ketchup, a food marker, or cut tiny pieces of food to form the shapes.


Yesterday Orson watched a show that involved climbing a mountain and was very excited about it. He laid his blanket over the back of the couch and pretended to climb that, so I went and got a long jumprope & ran it down the stairs & we had fun climbing up & down that. For lunch I cut a grilled cheese in half diagonally and then laid them on a plate to form mountains. He wouldn't eat his green beans, so I laid them along the bottom to form grass & threw on a few Cheerio flowers. (I still had to take away a mountain and make him eat the beans before he could have it) Orson also wanted some people climbing the mountains, so I added a few raisins. I'll have to take a pic next time!