Green Kid Crafts June 2013 Unboxing & Review!

Recently, a very nice woman in a group on Facebook that I joined, was giving these boxes out because she recently became an ambassador for the program. I was lucky enough to get one sent to me, THANK YOU GLORIA! This was June's box, which was Backyard Science! If you don't know what Green Kid Crafts is, it's a monthly subscription box full of awesome crafts for your little one to do! Each month is differently themed, and the current box gives you a little sneak peak at next month's box (which in this case is gardening). The price is $19.95 per month, $59.95 for 3 months, $119.95 for 6 months, or $219.95 every year. You can also add in sibling boxes, but that sky rockets the price in general (as much as $120 for a year!!!). You can also purchase previous boxes from their website, including this one, for $24.95! I'm a sucker for anything crafty, and must admit that even though I have 2 nieces (11 & 7) I had to keep this for myself...I was sick for a good 2 weeks and had nothing to do. I had some fun with it! :)

This was the box! It was packed with goodies and fun stuff! I will be going in order by project :) But first is the instructional things/snack!

Included in the box were these HappyTimes Organic Superfoods Caramel Yogurt & Apple Bits. These were dehydrated yogurt and apple pieces. I really loved the apple bites, they softened up and almost grew in your mouth! The yogurt on the other hand was gross. They tasted very sour and the texture was just strange.

You can purchase a box with 5 individual packs on Amazon for $8.60, making this sample size about $1.72

 Next is a letter with a pair of scissors that reads:

"Dear Green Kid,

Many of our projects call for scissors so we've included our favorite pair especially for you! Make sure that you keep these around because you'll use them for all of your future Green Kid Crafts projecys. We are so excited to learn, create, and explore with you!

Happy Cutting!
The Green Kid Crafts Team"

On the back of this card is a note to the parents, which I'm not going to include because it's WAY too long.

Then is the card of the projects included in this box. There are 4 this month! Sunprint Magnet, Leaf Pendant, Nature Collecting Bag, and Shadow Box. On the back of this card are the social media links for GKC, as well as a scavenger hunt for kids, and some facts. Did you know the secretion from worms contains nitrogen, which is an important nutrient for plants? GUH-ROSS.

The first project I have to share is the Leaf-Stamped Pendant! This little bag came with the items to make 2 leaf-stamped pendants! I had my 11 year old niece with me, so I made one, and she made one. The instructions are very clear on what to do. On the back, it continues to tell you what to do, while showing pictures all the way up to the finished project. It says that when your pendant is done, you can put it around your neck, on your backpack, or display it in your room.

The first item in the bag was this dried leaf. I'm not sure what kind of leaf this is, but after doing both pendants, it broke apart. Actually, in the middle of my nieces' pendant, it started falling apart and actually got stuck to her clay, we had to dig it out with our nails, not fun!

Next was the Natural Earth Paint! This was a pain! It said to mix with water, according to the directions it said 1 packet with 1 tsp of water. I did that, and it was SUPER liquidy. You can see in my finished product, the paint actually leaked under the leaf. It was too watery to be called paint.

It actually doesn't say how much this paint is online, but you can purchase this all natural paint from their website.

Next was the little eco-cup. This cup is supposedly made from plants...I'm not sure how true that is seeings as it's plastic. I wasn't aware plants could be made into plastic. This is used to mix the Natural Earth Paint in.

Next, it came with 2 mini packages of Sculpt It by Sargent Art. These little packages are plain white air dry clay. This is obviously used for the base of the pendant.

You can purchase a 150 count "classroom" pack from Dick Blick for $51.29 making these little packets about $0.35 a piece, making it $0.70 total.

Lastly is the string to tie through the hole of your pendant. This is recycled paper raffia ribbon. Plain and simple...haha

Here are the final products! Mine is on the left, A's is on the right.  Hers came out much better than mine because I did mine first, so I didn't know that the "paint" would be that watery. She used a lot less than I did. I think these are cute, and would be nice hanging from a rear view mirror in a car. :)

If you were wanting to recreate this project using materials at home, you could pick up any brand air dry clay, paint in any color unless you already have some, some yarn or string lying around, and a leave from outside :) It's easy to do, and you don't really need the instructions.

The next project in the box is the Nature Collecting bag! The instructions are very clear, but an adult is needed! You have to iron your design afterwards to make it actually adhere to the canvas. Whats cool is that on the back it has a couple more things you can do, one including the rubbing plate in the bag. You can use the rubbing plate to make suncatchers with white glue and food coloring! All you have to do is fill the leaf image with the glue and coloring, and let dry. You can then peel it off and stick where you'd like! The other craft is making your own rubbing plate with cardboard and glue. You just have to draw your design in glue, let it dry, and have your own rubbing plate! Neat!

The first thing in the bag was the rubbing plate! I got this awesome leaf, but I think there were multiple designs you could have gotten. I'm happy with this one! This is to be slipped in the bag, so you can rub on it and it leaves the design. I used to love doing this is art class!

Next are the Pentel FabricFun pastel dye sticks. The colors included are white, yellow, orange, red, green, blue and black. These create bright, vivid designs directly onto fabric. To lock the color in the fabric, you just take a clean sheet of computer paper, and iron it over the fabric design. You're design will end up on the sheet of paper as well :) This was really need to get, and will last me a while! This of course is used on the rubbing plate.

You can purchase these at Staples for $5.49

Lastly in this project is this mini canvas tote bag with a red handle. This is just your everyday, generic canvas bag. It's big enough to easily hold 2 cans of soda (just saying this as an example). I will be using it to carry some travel items when I sleep out. This is the base of the project.

This is the front of my bag. I'm obsessed with Rainbow colors, so I wanted to try and incorporate it into my bag. I think it came out pretty cool! I love the overlapping of the colors :) I couldn't get the outer edges because my rubbing plate was way too big.

This is the back of my bag. I wanted to use the black dye stick, so I decided to make it the center of the back. Then, just playing around, I wrote my name in crappy cursive and a heart...I was bored and experimenting.

If you wanted to recreate this project, you can purchase small canvas bags at Dollar Tree, get a pack of these pastel dye sticks at Staples, and create your own rubbing plate with cardboard and glue! This is a very neat idea, and would be perfect as a birthday party activity for kids :)

The last two projects are the Sunprint Magnet Frame, and the Summer Shadow Box. Now, I stupidly didn't take a picture of the box, but on the bottom of it, was a picture frame you had to cut out. In order to create your shadow box, you were to cut out the rest of the bottom to make a big hole. I'll be starting with the Magnet Frame of course.

Included were these sheets of sunprint paper. I've never seen or heard of these before, but they're awesome! When you put them in the sun, it lightens them. You then take them, and put them in cold water for 3 minutes, and that locks the color in. You're supposed to take flat items, put them on the sheet, and let the sun trace them and make imprints.

They also included 4 magnets, and 6 lady bug stickers. I was a little confused on the stickers, but it was to hold the picture onto the frame.

This is my final product! I took my Disney Trivia coins and threw them on the sheet. This frame was part of the box that I had to cut out. I really liked the way this came out, it's different!

Here is the back! I have a lady bug sticker in each corner, and on the sides.

This is my niece and I's shadow box. You were supposed to use the scavenger hunt on the back of the info card to look for items for your scavenger hunt. The problem is is that "worms, birds, and animal tracks" were on it, and there was no way in hell I was putting worms, animal tracks, or birds in this box. I personally didn't like this project. I think it's a little worthless, and if I were a parent, I wouldn't want it in my house. It just takes up space, and isn't really appealing. It wasn't really even fun to do my niece told me. I let her run around and pick the items up.

Overall, I'm really not sure that this is worth $19.95 a month. It seems a little high considering you can get most of the items in here at the dollar tree...I thought it was very fun to do, and I'm an adult (barely...I'm a kid who's the same age as an adult). I think this would be perfect for younger kids. I just found that some of the projects would get destroyed easily, and have to be thrown away. The pendants aren't really strong enough to be used on a backpack, I think it could get cracked and crumble easily. The picture frame is just cardboard and paper, so if someone was getting something out of the fridge and spilled it, it easily would suck in the water, juice, ect. And the shadow box was just a waste in my eyes. I really wanted to like this box, but just can't seem to wrap my head around the fact that it's $20.