Tuesday, February 2, 2010

Introducing my newest addition to the monster family!

The newest addition to the family are monster finger puppets & I'm hoping to have some hand puppets on the way too! I'm excited to add these to my repertoire for a few reasons: 1. I have been hoping to add an inexpensive item to my shop that won't take too much time to make. 2. It's such a great use for all my fleece scraps. I don't need to buy any additional materials for these mini-projects. I get to use the little leftovers of fabric that would otherwise be discarded (or kept in an ever-building scrap pile). 3. They're cute & fun!

I have a nice little story about the finger puppets & one of the non-profit organizations I support…

I think I've mentioned Comfort Zone Camp before… Basically it's an amazing organization that helps children deal with the loss of a loved one. Children from around the country who have experienced the death of an immediate family member can attend a camping weekend (free of charge) to help them heal and grow. Comfort Zone Camps "create an environment where grieving children can have fun and break the isolation death often brings, while learning valuable coping skills for their daily lives."

At a recent camp, I was able to give each of the campers in my group a little monster finger puppet. It was so much fun. They each went around the circle and used the finger puppet to tell (in a cute monster voice) what their favorite part of the weekend was. The magic moment for me, was at the memorial service, when each camper in my group used their finger puppet to say "in memory of my [mom, dad, brother, etc.]" in front of the whole audience of campers, volunteers, & parents. It was so precious and touching.

5 comments:

CreativeButterflyXOX said...

How cute are these? Love it :)

www.Brickworkz.com said...

Mary, these are SO cute! What a great idea to save the scraps and make people smile too. The presentation at camp was adorable, and you were working with the perfect age group for finger puppets too. Kids express themselves easier indirectly, and puppets are often used by experts! Great work. :-)

rachel said...

these were great! i saw it as a hugely creative way for them to get up there and say something that they probably have never been so brave to say - the finger puppets gave them so much courage! you're such a great big! ( :

Flytrap said...

It would be very, very wrong of me to purchase some of these for my own nearly-40-year-old amusement.

Wouldn't it?

Mary said...

I have some of these on my desk at work... my coworkers love to come by and play with them. It's fun!