fall leaves suncatchers

Some mornings (okay, most mornings) Ethan likes to wake up when it's still dark outside. This usually means we have hours until our morning activity or playdate. Is there a better way to kill time than with arts and crafts projects? (The answer: nope.) I mean, this is one project I wish I thought to prep ahead of time because peeling crayons for over thirty minutes at the crack of dawn while sipping my Starbucks was a little bit on the tedious side, but these homemade fall leaves look just beautiful. Anything I can do to convince myself that a typical fall happens in South Florida, I totally will.

I outlined some basic leaf shapes (or tried to -- I really should tattoo "I'm not an artist" across my forehead since I state that obvious observation so often) onto wax paper and had Ethan go to work laying out the crayon shavings on the leaves where he thought they should go.

Next you place a blank sheet of wax paper over the top and iron it lightly. It only takes a couple of seconds for the crayon to begin melting together.

You simply cut out the leaves and fix them to a window. We chose one overlooking my parents pool area.

And as the sun begin to shine through...

...the leaves were just so totally pretty!