It is the little ones last few days with his childminder before he starts full-time in school. He has been with her for 3 years and I wanted to give her a special gift that she would be able to remember him by. She has done so much for him and he really cares fo her.

I had made Thank you for helping me grow cards for the teachers at the end of the summer term and thought that it would be a great idea to try to do the same thing but in plaster.

Thank you for helping me grow is a tree with the children’s finger prints on the branches as leaves.

Items you will need:

Resin Plaster 1kg – bought from HobbyCraft £7.99

Silicone mould – I used a 9″ cake mould

Water – to  mix in with the resin powder

Paint – brown, green and red

Small paint brush

Modelling tools

Fine line blank ink pen

 

Instructions:

• Mix the plaster resin with 1 part water to 3 parts plaster. Pour the water into a clean bowl and sprinkle on the resin powder, leave for a minute and then mix together. Pour slowly into the mould.
• Leave aside to set. Just as the mould becomes hard, putty like, using a moulding tool inscribe the shape of the tree

• Now to add the thumb prints onto the branches, push down with some pressure in order to leave an imprint

 

• Leave to set completely

• Once dry, remove from the mould. Using a thin paint brush paint in the lines of the tree and then finger print in the leaves

 

Once set I wrote on his name and the date of the last day he would spend in the company of his childminder ( I say childminder but I would like to think of her as an extended part of pur family)

The finger prints and name gives more of a personal touch and hopefully she will see the love that has gone into the gift. She will be in our hearts forever and hopefully as we will be in hers.

A gift that can be kept forever