St Martin's Day in Glasgow

So it's November again. That time of the year where things seem to be falling over one another. We had Halloween, St Martin's and Bonfire night in the space of a week and to be honest, I'm glad it's over. We did have fun though. Having just returned from our holiday for Halloween, the costume was an improvisation of a new dress that passed as a witch's dress and random items from the charity shop - quite an outfit actually. Snowflake was stuck into a pumpkin outfit, as you do with toddlers. Our pumpkins were carved but not very elaborately, though there was lots of pumpkin soup and pumpkin pie.

Our crafting energy went mainly into the making of St Martin's lanterns (and general Halloween crafts). Thankfully there are some crafty people in our German Playgroup who had posted images of lanterns in preparation of the big lantern making event and I fell in love with the Elmer lantern. Thankfully, the girls did too, although Elmer hasn't as such featured around here much. What they loved about this lantern was how it transformed a milk bottle into an elephant with no effort at all and how they both were able to make the lantern because it's really so very simple.

You'll need a milk bottle - the biggest ones, 6 pints, are the best because the shape is more like an elephant and the lantern will have a decent size. We didn't have one, so went for a 4 pint and a 2 litre bottle, and the 4 pint one was still quite elephantesque, while the 2 litre one, well, it just about passed the elephant test so to say.

You cut the bottle along the line in the middle, and the handle will suddenly become a trunk. Feel free to cut out legs if you like. Next, cut transparent paper into small squares, get some glue and get sticking. We used a broad brush which is toddler friendly, and Snowflake (2 years) did make most of her lantern herself. Cubling had no problems just getting on with it without any help. To finish off, add some googly eyes and elephant ears cut out from cardboard.

Ideally, put some wire through the top and hang on a light stick. We didn't have wire and used pipe cleaners. The lantern is light so it worked well.

We were lucky to have lots of lantern events in Glasgow this year though we only managed to make the German playgroup one. It's lovely to see so many lantern events popping up now, with one in Battlefield and one in the Children's Wood in the West end too, and I'm sure there's more.  Plenty of opportunities to let those lanterns shine!