The Duck Box

For Valentine's Day our church had a little party for the younger children; all of whom were to make their own Valentine box for display and for a friendly contest. They broke them into age groups; ages 8 and younger in one group and then on up to 12 years or so in another group.

Well, Ellen just HAD to have one you know. Not that she knew anything about it...it was her mother who was rabid to make a box. About a year or so ago we found one of her little stuffed toys; a quacking duck, that had been catnapped by a stray and carried off into the hay shed; it had been mangled, but the quacker was still good in it. I took out the quacker and tossed the duck.

So I asked hubby; how would we go about making a duck Valentine box that quacked when we opened the lid? His sage answer; "I'll think on it."

Hmmm...yeah, right.

So, after a week or so of pondering, I came up with my solution to the make-it-quack issue.

Voila:

The Quacking Duck box:

Lift up on the top half of his bill firmly enough and he quacks. Here's the mechanism in back:


The box is actually just a large bleach bottle. (We specialize in those since we go through one of those huge 2 litre bottles every two weeks, for dairy use.) As you can see I just cut the top of the bottle almost off, so it would open, then cut the handle so that, when lifted, it would press on the quacker. Simple.

Ellen won a prize for creativity for her box. I felt bad at first, but then one other little guy had a 4 foot cannon box, mounted on cardboard wheels..etc, which he also won a prize for, though it was obvious that HE didn't design or make it all on his own either.

At any rate, the problem remains; how do I top this for next year?

Ha!

Comments

Frau Guten Tag said…
WOW!! I am soooo impressed! That is sooooo cute & creative! I have always struggled in the creativity department myself. But wow, that is truly awesome!
February 17, 2011 at 3:45 PM
Unknown said…
Wow... MY Mom NEVER did anything like THAT!! A cardboard shoe box and old red construction paper was the best she could do. I did better: bits of ribbon and lace and some actual design. But bleach bottles and quackers and adorable ducks..... Good for you!! Yeah, good luck topping that next year! Maybe a twirling ballerina.
February 17, 2011 at 11:43 PM
Calfkeeper said…
Thank you all. It was fun to make. This whole Valentine box thing is a new one on me. I remember back in gradeschool we just did envelopes or something liek that. I don't even remember Valentine boxes. Maybe it's because I hate the holiday.

There were some other great boxes there; one guy had made a paper mache Bob the Tomato. It was cute!
February 18, 2011 at 2:19 PM
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