The Game that Needs a Name

This project kind of got changed as I went along. I had in mind to make a basketball game snow globe. I let the kids try it out while I was in the middle of making it. They said it's boring, you should put in shelves and add a scoring system. So I did. Because I changed things as I went along, I don't have pictures of every step. Don't let the long how-to scare you, I was just trying to make the steps as clear as possible.

You will need:
1 glass jar-any size,  I used a gray poupon mustard jar
6 twist ties
a bead-I cut mine off a mardi gra necklace
lanyard
hot glue gun
pistachio shells
permanent marker(s) or paint
(tile, felt etc-some sort of scrap may come in useful when you are using the hot glue and need to hold the lanyard in place-I used a mirrored tile that I had handy, this way you can press and not burn yourself, the tile  or scrap will end up being hot glued to the lid of the jar)

1. Clean out the jar well.

2. Take twist ties and strip the paper off.

3. Take 3  of the wires from the twist ties that you just stripped and twist them together. This will make the wire stronger.

4. Repeat with the other 3 wires.

5. From both sets of twisted wire into a C shape.

6. Twist both C shapes together to form a circle.

7. You will need to measure where you want your wire circle that you created to be, and tie 2 even strips of lanyard onto the wire, on opposite sides.

8. You may need to knot the 2 lanyard strings together to glue the lanyard onto the lid of the jar. This may take a few attempts until you get it just where you want it. Cut off the excess from the knot and you may want to glue gun a top of the knot to prevent it from opening.

9. Wash your pistachio shells. Assign point values to the shells and write it on the side of the shell and inside the shell.

10. Hot glue gun the shells onto the walls of the jar assigning them places based on their point value. We did the higher numbers higher up in the jar.

11. Depending on how big your jar is, (or your preferences) you may want to bend the wire circle or squeeze it into an odd shape. Because our jar was small and our wire circle was almost as big as the jar, we decided to squeeze ours. However, if you are working with a bigger jar, you can always keep the circle round.

this is before we glued on the pistachio shells,
but it shows how we squeezed the wire

12. Place your bead inside the jar, screw on the lid and start scoring points make up your own rules or whatever.

It's completely optional if you want to glue gun the jar closed or not. If you have little kids, I would recommend glue gunning it shut because of the bead, but it's your choice.

Toddler Version

My original version might be more fun for toddlers. This version uses a super ball, googly eyes and no pistachio shells or beads  You will need to follow steps 1-8. Now to make it more fun, glue gun 2 googly eyes to the ball.  Screw on the lid and let your child try to get the ball in the hoop. (I was also going to add baby oil and glitter, but I didn't and I'm not sure if that would work.)

What can the kids do?

Kids can color or paint the shells all different colors and make a chart showing which color corresponds with which points. They can also color it and not have a point system.

They can decorate the tops of the lid with paper, felt, glitter, masking tape resist etc.
(Mom can cut out circles that will fit on the lid and have the kids decorate it while she assembles the game.)

They can paint the lids.


Short Video of the No Name Game (Please note, that the video has no sound)

Linking Up At:

http://www.abeachcottage.com/2011/07/linky-party-good-life-wednesday.html

http://www.domestically-speaking.com/

http://thetrendytreehouse.blogspot.com/

http://www.thethriftyhome.com/

http://paisleypassions.blogspot.com/2011/07/wandering-wednesday-blog-hop_19.html

http://savvysouthernstyle.blogspot.com/