Conker beetles

This is how it started:

An abundance of beautiful conkers from the park. What to do with them? Eva naturally started to play with them: counting, arranging, touching and, ahem, licking.

They seemed so shiny and beetle-y, so that is what they became.

I used a mixture of enamel paint (the little pots used for model-making) and ready mixed poster paint. The enamel paint gave a fantastic finish but took ages - at least 24 hours - to dry, whereas the poster paint took a couple of coats and dried quickly but also chipped easily. Nail varnish would be good, or some sort of coloured lacquer, if such a thing exists.

I made a nice box for them to live in and some grass to munch on. We took them back to the park. They went on the roundabout:

 the little elephant ride:

and then had a rest on a bench.

Eva wanted to sleep with them, a seal of approval if ever there was one. I am so pleased with how these turned out, they brought so much colour and play to a rainy gloomy day.

{the fab eleven}