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Making your life greener - one bite at a time.

Need a few activities to put young revelers in the party spirit? Try these fun and easy icebreakers - Festive Bubblers, Painted Buffalo Hides.

PICTURE IT 
Long before recapping the departing year's highlights became a televised tradition, the Plains Indians documented history on painted buffalo hides called winter counts.

For fun, your kids can create their own winter counts by recording the year's big moments on faux leather. For fake hides, simply tear pieces of paper from a brown grocery bag. Have your kids use crayons (pressing down hard) to personalize their canvases. Then, to create the look of leather, crumple the colored paper and dip it briefly in water mixed with a dab of brown watercolor paint. Unfold the dampened drawing and set it on newspaper to dry.


FLASHBACK
This holiday version of concentration is twice as memorable as the classic game. It's played with homemade cards decorated with pictures of favourite family moments and milestones from the previous year. To make a deck, first ask your child to choose six events she'd like to feature. For example, one might be the night you watched the Perseid meteor showers, or a day spent building a model car or finger painting. Next, cut out images from old magazines, newspapers or greeting cards to represent the chosen events. If you come up short, your child can always make a sketch of her own. Remember, you'll need to find two identical or at least similar images per event. Glue the images onto colored index cards (alternatively, you can use 4-inch squares cut from card stock or poster board), and the deck is ready for a match.

Note:Special care should be taken with bubble mixture to ensure that it does not come into contact with eyes and that it is not swallowed. Supervise the children closely so that they don't touch their eyes, nose or mouth before their hands are washed in clean water.

Bubble wands can also be made from wire loops or pipe cleaners. These can be poked into straws to cover any sharp ends. Younger children will find it easier to make bubbles by dipping fly swats into the solution and then waving them around.

If children would like to try catching and holding a bubble, get them to put their hands into the bubble mixture first - if they are very gentle the bubble won't burst. Pour bubble solution into a spray bottle to spray some bubbles.

Bubble Mixture Recipe

Ingredients

1/2 cup glycerine

1/2 cup water

1 tablespoon liquid organic detergent

(double, triple, or quadruple amounts if larger amounts of mixture required)

Method

1. Place water into container

2. Add detergent and glycerine

3. Stir mixture (get the children to do this with whisks and beaters)

4. Blow bubbles and have fun!