Life-Sized Magnetic Robot

Meet Bot.

S and I enjoy our mini Recycled Robots so much, I was inspired to make a bigger version.  I love life-sized things (like our Felt Board), but I also thought I could use his body as a magnet board.  It works brilliantly!  So for any of you who want a magnet board, but don't have wall space - this works a dream!!!

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For materials we used some cardboard boxes, white duct tape,six tall aluminum cans (our beans come in these tall cans - we use them to make chili!), three regular sized aluminum cans, HVAC venting, a thick mailing tube, aluminum foil, a box cutter, and a hot glue gun.

Since making Bot is at least a little involved, we decided to make a family project out of it this past weekend.  S was in charge of making Bot's fingers.  She decided he should have ten fingers, and based off the size finger she wanted, I pre-cut ten pieces of aluminum foil for her and she went to work shaping fingers.

My husband had a vision for Bot's feet (they need to be nice and big to prevent the robot from tipping), so he was in charge of that.

X...well, X was in charge of looking cute.  And exploring boxes.

Here's a back view of Bot so I can talk more about how he's constructed.  I took the three "head" cans and laid a piece of duct tape along the back of them to hold them together (loosely, granted).  I then used the measurements of the cans (height and width) to cut four pieces of cardboard to make a rectangle around them.  I used the white duct tape along all the edges of everything, as well as to hold cardboard pieces together.  Once I had the cans "boxed" in, I used a glue gun on the back of Bot's head along the edges of the cans and between them to lock them in place.  I repeated this same procedure to make Bot's body.

I cut the HVAC venting roughly in half, and then squeezed the far opening in half to close it.  Along that seam, I used the hot glue gun again to attach each of Bot's foil fingers.  I used hot glue along the circumference of the HVAC venting to attach Bot's finished arms.

I used hot glue again to attach Bot's ear pieces and his legs.  My husband used a box cutter to cut out an opening for the cardboard mailing tube to sit inside Bot's box feet.  We used hot glue at the base to make Bot's tube legs more stable.

S decorated Bot's face completely by herself (it's SO CUTE!) and then set to work decorating his body.  We used several of the magnets we created for our Recycled Robots (you can read more about how we made them in that post if you're curious) plus some of our beloved Tegu blocksand some of our geometric Melissa and Doug magnets.

It really is a good amount of magnetic space (and you could, of course, build an even bigger robot) for those of you looking for an alternate to a wall mounted magnet board.

We took Bot outside for a photo shoot because it was too dark inside with our gloomy weather.  I just adore how S made his tiny hat and cute little cheeks with the Tegu blocks.

Best friends!

And then today we took a few more photos indoors.

I love that he's almost as tall as S!

We love our Bot and hope we've inspired you to create your own.  If you do, we'd love to see a picture on our Facebook or Google+ wall!!!

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Please always supervise your infant/child at play.  Please stay within arms reach and never leave infants/children unattended.

Recycled Robots

Preschool+

This is running as a guest post over at Creative Family Fun; please click here to hop on over and read it there!

Giant Felt Board

Older Toddler +

As you may have noticed, we love felt.  It's so inexpensive and versatile and even durable!  We use it a lot.  Because our felt Christmas tree was such a big hit, I was inspired to make a HUGE felt board for S in the Reading Room.  I used just the prickly side of self-adhesive velcro to stick the felt sheet to the wall.  This is roughly a yard and a half of black felt.  I waited until I had a good coupon for a local fabric store, so it was less than $5!  I chose to frame it out with wood, but you certainly don't have to.  I used MDF floor trim - the most basic kind - and had Home Depot cut it for me (I had pre-measured the lengths I wanted).  So the trim cost roughly another $6.  If you don't have room for something like this in one of your rooms, it would be a great addition to hallway, perhaps?  We had our felt Christmas tree up on one of our dining room walls.

I like that the board is bigger than S, so that we can make S-sized creations.  Our first undertaking with the new board was to create a robot.  S loves robots almost as much as dinos.

My Dad (my go-to project helper, hahaha) had just helped me finish hanging the frame the night before. S and I both just love it!

I used a coupon at the fabric store to score all these felt sheets at 20% off (and they're only 29 cents to start with!).

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S got to dictate color size and shape of every robot part - and she was also in charge of placement.  Learning how to stick pieces of felt to a board does take a bit of practice.  I feel like S wasn't able to do this without getting frustrated until she was an older toddler (she's a seasoned pro now).  This could also be fun for a younger toddler, but it would involve a lot of parental help (which sometimes young toddlers don't want!  Ha!).

Robot's arms needed "thick, white stripes".

And of course he needed "a sparkly red heart" - she was undecided at first as to whether his heart should be under his body so it was "inside his body" or whether it should show on top.

And finally, she decided he ought to be saying "Wow", so I cut out the letters and she sounded out the letter ordering.  I had planned on making one or two other robots, thereby completing a "mix and match" robot felt set, but alas, S insisted on only one.  The mention of other robot friends joining him on the giant felt board was met with a "but I am his friend!!!"  Hahaha.  She finally relented the next day and let him have some pets.  I think he's much happier now, don't you?

I just love following her directions to create whatever it is that's in her head.  This is definitely not how I would have made a robot, which is what is so special to me about the process.  If I'd just made a robot set for her, I would have missed meeting the robot friend she'd envisioned!  And since he's pretty cute, it would have been quite a shame.  :)

You can read more about our Reading Room, where the giant felt board lives here.

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Please always supervise your infant/child at play.  Please stay within arms reach and never leave infants/children unattended.