We had so much fun with our Life Sized Felt Anatomy Model, and S learned so much from it, that we decided to put a Halloween spin on it and make a life-sized skeleton.  It makes for a great Halloween decoration, and though it's probably a bit spookier than our Plaster Handprint Spiders, it is still a neat way to keep track of how tall she was this Halloween.  She's already excited to see how much bigger next Halloween's skeleton will be.  And since she's really interested in learning more about the human body and bones, it was a playful way for us to talk more about all that.

I bought two big sheets of white poster board at a craft store.  Then I had S lay down and I traced the various parts of her body.  I explained that mama would do her best to draw the bones, and that these were about the size and shape of them, but they would look a little different in person - like, for instance, they wouldn't be flat!  After I traced, I sketched a little bit of detail into each.  Here you can see I've drawn some rough openings in her ribs, pelvis, and skull.

Next I cut the pieces out while X and S ran around giggling.  They stopped periodically to inspect and play with the various bones.  As I'd get a bigger bone cut out, we'd hold it up to S's body and I'd have her squish to feel it.  For instance, I'd have her press on her kneecap and then show her the corresponding paper bone.

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We joined the bones with brads.  I'd hoped that S could do this part, but the brads I'd picked up from the store were SHARP!  So I did the brads myself - I found that using scissors to poke a hole where I was going to place the brad made it much easier.

If you're looking to make the project faster, you can go with an even more simplified set of bones - that would also lead to fewer brads (the portion that took the longest).  All in all S was thrilled with her skeleton.  He (she?) is hanging in one of our windows waving!  When Halloween's over, we'll put him away with all of our other decorations and pull him out the following year to see how much S has grown!