Happy New Year, my Lovelies! I hope you enjoyed a relaxing holiday season filled with laughter and gratitude, surrounded by the people you love most.
As we head back to school and work, and return to our regular routines, I’d like to take a moment to thank each and every one of you for the support, encouragement and love that you’ve shown me this past year.
2014 was a year of incredible growth and success for Happy Hooligans! Thousands of followers hopped on board here to follow my blog, hundreds of thousands joined my facebook page (we’re approaching 1/2 million followers over there, so get on over there and give us a like – if you haven’t already!), and in the past 12 months, you guys have viewed more than 15 MILLION (!!!) pages here on my site! Man, that number just blows my mind!
What’s cool is that our followers here at Happy Hooligans hail from 236 different countries! From America to Zambia, my posts are truly reaching every corner of the globe. You have no idea how happy it makes me to know that the crafts and activities that we do in my small home daycare are reaching so many of you, and inspiring you to get crafty and creative with the kids in your life.
A huge, heart-felt thank you goes out to every, single one of you for reading my posts, for sharing them with other parents, teachers and caregivers, and for all of the supportive, appreciative comments you leave here. I read every one of them.
Before we move into 2015 with a host of new crafts and activities, I thought it would be fun to look back over the posts that YOU guys loved best in 2014. If you missed them the first time around, enjoy. And if you’ve seen them, and loved them, please pass them along to others who may love them as well.
Thank you, my lovelies for continuing to inspire and motivate me to be the best that I can be, and for all that YOU do to enrich the lives of the amazing, little people who surround you. xx
Happy Hooligans’ Most Popular Posts of 2014
Our number-one, most-popular post in 2014 was our 2 Ingredient Cloud Dough! You guys viewed this post over 1.5 million times! Made with 2 kitchen ingredients, this gloriously-scented, silky-soft, mouldable sensory dough is a hit with kids and adults alike, and it takes only FIVE minutes to make! If you haven’t tried it yet, put it on your must-do list this year!
We’re all for recycling, reusing, repurposing and upcycling here, so when a friend of mine gave me a grocery bag full of clean, empty Keurig K-Cups, we set about finding all kinds of ways to use them. From the craft room and kitchen to the playroom and garden, we came up with this collection of 25 ways to re-use your Keurig’s K-Cups.
It wasn’t at all surprised at all that our Giant Homemade Bubble Recipe made the top-ten list! This bubble mix is AMAZING, and as you can tell by all the photos in the post, it truly does make the biggest, bestest backyard bubbles EVER!
Our October stats went through the roof when you guys discovered my simple pumpkin-carving hack! This post was viewed almost 1/2 million times in the weeks leading up to Halloween! It really is a terrific little trick to make lighting your candle SO easy! You’ll never carve your pumpkin the same way again. Really!
I had so much fun rounding up the ideas for this post! What’s better than a kid-made gift? A kid-made gift that you can really use and enjoy! In this collection, you’ll find 40+ kid-made gifts that look grown-ups will really use. Bonus: they all look AMAZING!
“Let it go, let it GO…” My daycare consisted only of 4 girls in 2014, and they were OBSESSED with the Disney movie “Frozen”. You can just imagine all the imaginary Anna and Elsa play that we had going on here every day. I actually embraced the girls obsession because it gave me a terrific theme to base many of our crafts, experiments and activities upon. This ice and salt experiment – “Melting Elsa’s Frozen Hands” was a HUGE hit with the hooligans, and judging from my stats, a quarter of a million others out there loved it as well!
This 2-ingredient white clay recipe soared to the top of the charts for me in the weeks leading up to Christmas. I guess technically it’s 3 ingredients when you count the water, but in any account, it’s quick and easy to whip up, and it makes for the loveliest, pure- white ornaments.
This was, without a doubt, my personal favourite post in 2014. The reason for that is because this one came straight from my heart. I’ve had never written about my own kids on the blog before, and putting together this collection of 40 of my boys’ all time favourite books was a sentimental trip down memory lane for me. I thoroughly enjoyed reminiscing about all the countless hours that my boys and I spent snuggled together, reading these terrific novels. I was thrilled to learn that many of the books that I listed were your favourites too.
If you’ve been following me for any length of time, you KNOW how much we LOVE our cardboard tubes! We always have a huge stash of them on hand here. They’re one of my go-to craft supplies. They’re cheap, totally versatile, and you can make almost anything out of them. Here are 22 of our favourite cardboard tube projects.
And last but not least, Coloured Cloud Dough. As much as we LOVE the silky, soft white cloud dough that you saw at the top of this page, I was longing to colour a batch of it. After several failed attempts (read the post to find out what they were), I hit on something that worked beautifully! Months later, our coloured cloud dough is still as vibrant and beautiful as the day we made it.
And there you have it: the ten posts that made it to the top of my blog last year!
It wouldn’t have happened with out all of you reading and loving and sharing them. So once again, thank you! I am so grateful that you found us and that you love us, and I am very much looking forward to moving into 2015 together. xx
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Jackie is a mom, wife, home daycare provider, and the creative spirit behind Happy Hooligans. She specializes in kids’ crafts and activities, easy recipes, and parenting. She began blogging in 2011, and today, Happy Hooligans inspires more than 2 million parents, caregivers and Early Years Professionals all over the globe.
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