As part of the global Mozilla Maker Party movement, The Sprout Fund hosted the Pittsburgh Maker Party this Saturday at the Society for Contemporary Craft in the Strip District, celebrating a second year of maker activities across the region.

For many children, Saturday mornings are a time for goofing off with friends, playing games on their iPad, learning gymnastics or competing on a team in an athletic tournament.

At a Saturday “Maker Party” organized by the Sprout Fund, hundreds of parents and children stoked their creativity by producing everything from art to videos at the Society for Contemporary Craft in the Strip District.

At a dozen different stations, children and adults could story-board a movie, build puppets, learn gardening basics, sew, make a mobile app or dip their hands in water to create homemade textured paper.

From TechShop to the Union Project to the Remake Learning Digital Corps, Pittsburgh’s best and brightest maker projects and organizations were represented, giving kids (and their parents) a chance to try their hand at all sorts of activities that supported STEAM principles.

Another popular draw was producing handmade paper from a sticky, watery mix of cotton, soda ash and Japanese knot weed, an invasive plant that grows in abundance here. The teacher, Albert Pantone, is a recreation therapist who works at the John Kane Regional Center in Glen Hazel and lives in Larimer.

“I didn’t know that this was how you made paper,” said Grace Banke, 15, of New Kensington.

Read the whole article on the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette website.