Spring Blooms Projects

Watching green shoots poke out of the ground as the snow melts is one of the most exciting parts of this time of year. Everything begins to smell fresh and alive again and colors appear so much more vivid! We embrace the feeling of the warm sunshine on our faces after a long winter. To welcome the new flowers (and April showers), we have gathered a list of some of our favorite floral craft projects. Enjoy!

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Scrap Paper Crafts for Kids - Celebrating National Craft Month

Here we are, celebrating the first week of Spring. Can you believe it’s already here? Depending on where you live, this winter either felt cold or colder. Maybe you were even feeling a bit stir-crazy, ready to get out of the house and peek in on your gardens. Hopefully, you’re seeing the first signs of spring: crocus, tulips, and hyacinth peeking out of the ground.

March is full of exciting celebrations: from the first day of spring and St. Patrick’s Day to National Craft Month! We, at Pacon, think every month is “craft month.” Don’t you agree?

As arts and craft supply collectors, we also have to celebrate practice spring cleaning. Remember that feeling you had last August when you set up your classroom for the school year and everything had a purpose and was in its intended place? It was absolutely glorious, wasn’t it? After zooming through the school year as fast as you and your students did, things became an awful mess!

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Tidying Up Your Classroom - Marie Kondo Style

On New Year’s Day in 2019, professional organizer Marie Kondo took the world by storm when she debuted her Netflix series, Tidying Up. She first published her book on the same concept (her KonMari method) in 2011 but didn’t truly explode into virality until this year. In her series, she comes to the rescue of families who are at wit's end with their household clutter. We can relate to the clutter chaos even at work! Can you?

Let’s get started with cleaning up the classroom -- for good!

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Handwriting Activity Ideas

Let’s ask an age-old question: how do you get this generation excited when it comes to practicing cultural traditions? Kids are the purveyors of all-things-new and cool and often leave their elders (and their elders’ habits) in the dust. Churning butter and pickling fish? Yeah, no thanks.

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Four Last-Minute Valentine's Day Crafts for Kids

Trying to come up with a super-duper last-minute Valentine’s Day craft project for your students? Don’t worry -- we’ve got your back! We put together FOUR easy DIY (or let’s be honest, mostly DIY) projects for you to share with your class.

*Hint: You can repurpose each of these projects for all your favorite holidays!

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Where do Fun & Imagination Meet?

On Creativity Street®, of course!

We're so excited to share Creativity Street's new look and new home with you!

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Riverside 3D™ Challenge

We had the pleasure of exhibiting at You can MAKE it in Northeast Wisconsin, a career expo focused on the manufacturing industry. The event was sponsored by NEW Manufacturing Alliance and hosted in Greenville, Wisconsin.

Several local manufacturers gathered to share career opportunities and engage with 7th-grade students from both Greenville and Hortonville, Wisconsin. Students chose who they wanted to meet with prior to the event and visited the manufacturers in assigned groups. It was great to teach the kids more about Pacon, and learn the career paths they were starting to think about.

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Valentine's Day Projects

Looking for a unique valentine for your special someone? We have you covered. Scroll through these lovely ideas and find the inspiration you need to get crafty.

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Composition Book Guide

Pacon offers many styles of composition books to meet a wide range of needs, grade levels, and uses. Composition books typically feature a sewn or taped binding that securely holds the sheets together. Without a spiral binding, the books can be stacked together on desks or in backpacks without getting tangled. Read on to learn about our most unique composition books.

 

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NAEYC

This was our first year exhibiting at the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) conference and we had a blast! All four Pacon representatives said the same thing: "Let's do it again next year!" 

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Catalog Sun Part 2

Our graphics department has been hard at work putting together the 2018 catalog, and in August we shared the history of our catalog covers. If you recall, we alluded that this year we're giving our Graphics Manager, Steve, a break from crafting a creative sun. So who was in charge this year?

Meet Samantha.

Samantha was a very creative intern who helped the marketing team out with several projects, including this year's catalog cover! 

Read on to learn more about Samantha and get a sneak peek at this year's sun.

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Ella Bella Photography Backdrops

Ella Bella® Photography Backdrops are easy to use for photographers of any skill level. These versatile paper backgrounds are available in over 25 patterns, and are perfect for a wide variety of photography needs including cake smash sessions, newborns, child, seniors, maternity, pet photography and more!

"The best thing about our backdrops is that they do not require a professional backdrop stand," Lori, product manager, said. 

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Mind Sparks® Learning Games

Our Mind Sparks™ line of learning games provides a fun way to engage children and help teach math concepts, foreign languages and sentence structures. Mind Sparks offers a variety of card games, foam blocks and dry erase games that make Learning & Fun ALL IN ONE!™

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Teachers' Corner: Meet Ashley N.

We're excited to turn our blog over to Ashley N., a Kindergarten teacher in Marquette, Michigan. Ashley's mom is a member of the Pacon Customer Service Team, so of course she is very familiar with Pacon, and was already using several Pacon products in her classroom. We love how bright and colorful her room is.

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Catalog Sun

As we prepare our product catalog for 2018, we are taking time to reflect on the past 20 years of catalog covers all created by our Graphics Manager, Steve. Since 1997 he has been tasked with turning our sun logo into a three-dimensional piece of art for our catalog cover and he has never let us down.

Read on to get to know Steve and take a look at his catalog art collection.

 

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Teachers' Corner: Meet Eileen C.

We teamed up with Eileen as she prepped her classroom for the coming school year. Eileen bought decorative accents from Schoolgirl Style, and used several Pacon products that coordinate with the woodland theme she chose.

Eileen comes to us from Omro, Wisconsin, and we're happy to turn our blog over to her so she can share all the details!

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Back-to-School Decor Ideas

Fall will be here before you know it, and you'll be welcoming new students to your class. Have you started prepping your room yet? Here are some tips and ideas to spark your imagination.

Fadeless® Paper is great for on any bulletin board display, but can be used on other spaces too! Depending on the surface, it can be stapled, taped or tacked in place.  

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Paper 101: Board and Basis Weight

What does "basis weight" really mean? What is the difference between poster board and railroad board? With so many paper terms, it's hard to keep everything straight. Even for us Pacon folks.

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Classroom Photoshoot

See our behind-the-scene photos from our elementary school photoshoot, featuring our new Mind Sparks® products, Fadeless® Paper and Riverside® Construction Paper. The children were great to work with, and were excited to play games and create projects for us. 

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Riverside Paper Company

Today we celebrated 10 years since acquiring the Riverside Paper Company. This acquisition brought Pacon a wealth of resources, including employees, brands and history.

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The Early Years

Fadeless® Paper was developed in 1960, and is still one of Pacon's most recognized brands. Its true fade-resistance color impressed teachers then, and continues to today.

Even older than Fadeless Paper is Corobuff®. This unique corrugated paper was developed in 1954 by Bob Allen, a sales representative. Without Corobuff Paper and Bob Allen, the Fadeless brand may not exist.

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Pacon + Fresh Artists

This year, we launched our Art1st® Gold Frame Watercolor Paper in collaboration with Fresh Artists. A portion of the proceeds from every purchase of this paper goes back to Fresh Artists.

This student-grade paper works well with any wet media. It features a placard to easily display the artist’s name. The gold frame instantly turns any work of art into a finished masterpiece!

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Wiggle Eye Week

Our mission is to show the world that Creativity Street® Wiggle Eyes can bring life to anything!

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