Crafts Archives - Page 17 of 20

Birthday Hat Christmas Tree Craft for Kids

December 2, 2012 By Deirdre

In the past we have made a Christmas wreath pasta snack and cardboard advent wreath. Before you take a moment to check them out, I want to share with you a birthday hat Christmas tree craft idea.

Birthday Hat Christmas Tree Craft

Every year one of the sibling’s in my husband’s family organizes and hosts a Thanksgiving/ Family Reunion. The final evening of our Thanksgiving/ Family Reunion is always a Christmas celebration. We have a white elephant exchange and my husband’s mom passes out her Christmas gifts to each of her five children’s families.

This year was our turn to host the family reunion. Everyone came from Mississippi, Oklahoma, and Georgia to visit with us in South Carolina. There are four children in our family under the age of five. I thought it would be fun for the kids to create the table centerpieces. During one of the family events before the Christmas celebration.

Birthday Hat Christmas Tree Craft for Kids

I covered party hats I had purchased from a dollar store with green felt ahead of time and created a sample tree for the children to see before we met to have dinner on Thursday night.

The children were each given a party hat Christmas tree to decorate with sticky backed foam shapes that had a Christmas theme. I put out so sparkly gold pipe cleaners that the kids could use as garland. I think they did a great job creating their trees. Some of the trees are loaded up with stickers. A few of the tree makers decided that their trees didn’t need a lot of bling.

If you like this Christmas tree craft, here are some more Christmas crafts you will want to try:

Christmas Craft for Kids- Hanger Reindeer

Candy Cane Reindeer

Five Little Christmas Trees Song and Craft

Cardboard Advent Candy Wreath for Kids

November 25, 2012 By Deirdre

Time to get this Holiday Hop of Goodies going! For the next 2 weeks I will be posting holiday skinny mini recipes, crafts, decorating ideas, giveaways and more! Today I am going to share with you a cardboard advent candy wreath. Kids will love taking one piece of candy off the cardboard Adventwreath each day during Advent. My son has enjoyed having this up at our house.

We made an Advent candy wreath out of an old cardboard box. A plastic lid was used to trace the circles that make up this wreath. We just overlapped the circles until we had connected the first to the last. Cutting out cardboard isn’t easy. I used an X-Acto knife to cut out the wreath and then scissors to trim off the rough edges. If you have access to thin cardboard , it would be much easier to cut out.

Holiday Hop for Goodies- Cardboard Advent Wreath

After the wreath was cut out, JDaniel sponge painted our advent wreath green with a leave shaped sponge. I know you can’t see the leaves shapes once the paint in on the advent candy wreath. I just thought paint with a leaf would be fun.

Then we threaded four ribbons through pre-made holes (scissor cuts) in the cardboard to represent the four Sundays of Advent. Finally, twenty-four small candy canes were taped onto the wreath with cellophane tape.

One candy cane will be removed each day until we get to Christmas. This cardboard advent wreath will help us count down to Christmas and be used as during our discussion of advent.

If you like this Advent candy wreath, here are some more Christmas crafts you will like:

Threaded Star Tree

Doily Painted Angel

Branch Bracelets

Paper Bag Gingerbread House

You will find even more craft ideas for kids on my Crafts for Kids Pinterest board.

Thanksgiving for Kids -Table Setting Ideas

November 21, 2012 By Deirdre

Thanksgiving for Kids - Table Setting for Kids

Are your children looking for ways to help you get ready for Thanksgiving? Are you looking for something for them to do while you are rushing around your house getting ready for guests? Creating Thanksgiving crafts for kids that can be used on your holiday table is a great idea. These three table setting elements are easy to put together and if children are having to make eight or ten of them could take them a little while to make.

The turkey treat cups requires only wiggly eyes, some colored sheets of foam, and a clear plastic cup. Literally all you have to do is cut out feathers and a beak out of foam. Then glue the eyes, feathers, and beak onto the plastic cup. If you have wiggly eyes and foam that have sticky backs you don’t even need glue.

The Mayflower sail straw is just a piece of white foam cut into a sail. A blue straw was laced through holes punched into the sail. If you have straws of various colors, you could have the children create a pattern of straws with sails by having every other cup of the table be the same color.

The napkin ring can be made by wrapping felt around a toilet paper tube that has been cut down. A simple turkey can be created with felt or foam. The turkey is then glued onto the felt wrapped tube. I didn’t add feet to my turkey, but you could. I bet they would look adorable.

If are looking for a more formal look for your Thanksgiving table, you might think about creating a table setting like this for Thanksgiving breakfast or the leftover snack on Thanksgiving evening.

Here some more Thanksgiving for kids activities:

Paper Plate Turkey

Building Thanksgiving Words with Letter Feathers

Lantern Turkeys

Thanksgiving Science -Sink or Float

Gus, the Pilgrim Turkey- Read.Explore.Learn.

November 16, 2012 By Deirdre

Gus, the Pilgrim Turkey loves each and everyday to the fullest. Everyday is an adventure until he finds out that he won’t be celebrating New Year’s Eve. The animals on his farm share with him all about Thanksgiving. He hears about its history and how it is celebrated today.

Gus decided he needs to head south just as the geese do. Gus isn’t able to fly South. He has to walk.On his journey south he goes through Mexico and continues all the way to the tip of Chile. When he arrives in Chile, he stows away on boat that will take him further south.

When he is found he jumps ship and ends up with penguins. Guess what the penguins announce he is just like the pilgrims. He was looking for a new land that would give him freedom.

What did we do to explore Gus, the Pilgrim Turkey?

Gus Walking Finger Puppet

Gus, the Pilgrim Turkey- Read.Explore.Learn.

Gus needs to run away in the story to keep safe. We made a turkey finger puppet that can run away too. You just put your fingers through the back of the puppet so you can bend your fingers out the front of the turkey and make him run.

The puppet shape was cut out of an old pizza box and painted brown.

Then we added feathers, a center circle and a head with beak to the puppet to finish it up. A few black marker dots gave the turkey eyes. Then he was ready to run.

Here are some of my favorite posts from last week:

Fantastic Fun and Learning created a wonderful soldier craft after reading the book Hero Dad.

Helping Little Hands created an wonderful sculpture to go with the book The Scarecrow’s Dance. I just love it.How have you explored books this week?

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links.

Turkey Trouble- Read.Explore.Learn

November 9, 2012 By Deirdre

The turkey in Turkey Trouble realizes that he is in trouble and decides to disguise himself as other animals on the farm. Every time he thinks he has found a winning costume a different farm animal recognizes him. He then tries to pretend he is one of them.His disguises work for him in the end! What is he at the end of the story? He is a pizza delivery man. Thank goodness the family likes pizza.

I love the turkey’s disguises. He uses upcycled costumes to keep him off the table.

Turkey Hat

We glued a set of yellow turkey legs, a turkey head with face, and a bunch of turkey feathers to a brown band of construction paper and made the cutest turkey hat.

Paper Bag Turkey

We gathered together newspaper, construction paper feathers, wiggly eyes, a turkey head and facial features made of construction paper, a paper bag, and a bread tag to make the paper bag turkey.

Then we stuffed the bag with newspaper and closed the bag with the bread tie.

The feathers were attached next to the back of the bag just above the bread tag. The opening of the bag spread out made a great support for the feathers.

JDaniel added the eyes and beak to the turkey’s head before I attached it to the front of the bag.

We ended the craft by adding his feet. I think he came out really cute.

If you like the Turkey Trouble crafts, here are some more wonderful turkey themed activities you will like:

Lantern Turkeys

Building Words with Turkey Feathers

Paper Plate Turkey Crafts

Thanksgiving Themed Sink and Float Activity

Thanksgiving for Kids- Homemade Table Settings

Cornucopia of Prayer- Craft and Activity

Science Kids- Exploring Turkey Basters

Gratitude Turkey- Each Feather Shares a Blessing

Please link your book exploration posts below.

Little Owl’s Night Craft and Snack Ideas- Read.Explore.Learn.

November 2, 2012 By Deirdre

As you read the story Little Owl’s Night, you get to travel along with Little Owl as he travels through the air watching all the other nocturnal animals. There are fireflies dancing, moths fluttering toward the moon, and so much more. This tale takes you from the beginning of the night to the end of an evening just as Little Owl goes to sleep.The picture and words in this beautiful book flow. We were introduced to this book during a local story time. I loved watching and listening to this story unfold.

Owl Craft

We created a torn paper owl with cupcake liner eyes! The torn paper was added to cut-out of an owl to make him look like he has feathers. Then a piece of orange paper was used to give the owl a beak and claws. After gluing on two cupcake liners yellow circles and smaller black circles were added to complete the owl’s eyes.He looks ready to take in all the late night creatures and events. I love the texture the torn paper adds to the owl!

When the owl was dry, he was glued to a piece of black paper. The paper makes the various colors of the owl pop!

Owl Sandwich

JDaniel had an owl sandwich created with Colby Jack cheese and whole grain bread to celebrate our study of owls. The cheese used for his feathers has tiny triangles cut out of it to give it a feathery effect. The owl’s ears, feet and beak are also made of cheese. His eyes are small round tomato pieces with tiny pieces of olives on top. He loved his Little Owl’s Night lunch!If you like these Little Owl’s Night activities, here are some wonderful ways to explore books that people linked up last week:

Train Up a Child shared a wonder post on pumpkin exploring done after reading the book The Pumpkin Gospel called Carving Pumpkins with Kids.Reading Confetti linked a post called Easy Dress Up Hate {Paper Plate Craft}. The hats were made after reading a book called Halloween Hats.

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links.

Halloween Craft- Milk Jug Skeleton

October 31, 2012 By Deirdre

There isn’t an x-ray needed to see the bones in our milk jug skeleton. Last weekend we visited the Roper Mountain, a local science center, near us for a Halloween event. While at the Roper Mountain Science Center, we saw these wonderful milk jug skeletons. They looked so cool. I knew I just had to make a milk jug skeleton for our yard.

Roper Mountain Science Center’s Milk Jug Skeleton

I have been forgetting to put out our recycling on Mondays so, we had enough milk jugs to create one. This skeleton took six milk jugs to create.

Making Our Milk Jug Skeleton

The first milk jug was used to create his head. The Roper Mountain skeleton used the back of the milk jug to create the facial features of the skeleton. I created the face using the jug handle as our skeleton’s nose. They also turned the milk jug upside down so he won ‘t have a cap on his head. Our skeleton has a cap on his head because his mouth would have had to be under the handle if I had flipped our jug upside down.

We used a second jug to create the skeleton’s chest. I cut out ribs and a breast bone out of the second jug. To keep the ribs and breast bone cut out symmetrical I cut a template out of paper and traced it onto the jug before cutting the design out. I didn’t cut out the back of the skeleton’s chest the way they did a Roper Mountain on their milk jug skeleton . It probably would have let more light in. I want to reuse this milk jug skeleton and thought not cutting out the back would give him more stability.I used brace fasteners to attached the skeleton’s shoulders to his trunk. The shoulders were handles cut out of the third and fourth milk jug.

The hip section of the skeleton was cut out of the top third of the fifth milk.

The milk jug caps were then glued on the milk jug sections. When they had dried, I strung fishing line down through the head cap, then through the trunk section, and down through the hips. The fishing line allows the skeleton to rotate and move, but not swing wildly.

The remaining milk jug and the leftover pieces of the other jugs were used to create the bones in the arms and legs, hands, knee caps and feet. Two of the arm pieces and two of the leg pieces had oval holes placed in them to represent the two lower arm and leg bones.

The arm and leg sections all got holes punched in them. Paper clips were threaded onto bones and they were attached to each other.

I think our skeleton came out pretty well.

Did you create Halloween craft at your house?

This post is linked to Mrs. Matlock’s Alphabe Thursday.

Some of My Guest Posts from Other Sites for September

October 4, 2012 By Deirdre

Every one in awhile I like to give you heads up on guest posts that I have written for other blogs or websites.Today I thought I would share them with you. If you feel so lead, I would love for you to visit them, but I totally understand if all you have time for is to read over the list below.

Guest Posts from Other Sites

Guest Posts for Kids Activities Blog

This paper plate fall-themed barn is a great way to display symbols of fall.

Some of My Guest Posts from Other Sites for September - Pumpkin Cling

We had the best time exploring ribbon and creating a pumpkin window cling. It is still hanging up in JDaniel’s room.

Some of My Guest Posts from Other Sites for September- Stencil Painting

We have used cookie cutters for years for Muffin Tin lunches, cutting cookies, and play dough play. This time we used cookie cutters as stencils for painting.

Guest Posts for Kiwi Crate

I don’t think I mentioned that I have started working with the Kiwi Crate to contribute to their Recipes for Fun database. Here are some of the activities I have contributed to them:

Some of My Guest Posts from Other Sites for September-Fall Harvest Bento Box

A fall harvest-themed bento with a harvest moon and fruitful tree. I walk you through how to create this meal on the Recipes for the Fun site.

Some of My Guest Posts from Other Sites for September - Columbus Day Bento Box

I also walk through how to create a Columbus Day Bento Box.

Some of My Guest Posts from Other Sites for September - Neon Green Ooze

JDaniel and I made Neon Green Ooze. Can you guess who picked the color?

Some of My Guest Posts from Other Sites for September - Storytelling Stones

We create Native American Storytelling Stones. These have been great for creating new stories about the First Americans.Guest Post Crayon Freckles

I am thrilled to be guest posting on how to create the Columbus boat craft on Crayon Freckles tomorrow.

Here are some posts from right here on JDaniel4’s Mom that I think you will love:

Roll and Cover Corn Mat
Corn and Pumpkin Weaving
Driving on a Corn Stalk

The Pout-Pout Fish Themed Recycle Fish Mobile

August 17, 2012 By Deirdre

This week I am going to share a wonderful children’s book called The Pout-Pout Fish by Deborah Diesen. The pout- pout fish has a mouth that looks down turned. He decides that it means that he needs to be dreary all the time. The other sea animals try to get him to smile. He just won’t. He says he can’t he doesn’t have a choice. By the end of the book he finds he does have a choice and a wonderful smile if he will only swim upside down. (Spoiler Alert: A kiss helps make him smile too.)

This wonderful book is filled with rhyme you will love reading it all of the time.

How did we explore the book The Pout-Pout Fish?

Recycled Bottle Fish Mobile

JDaniel has been asking for mobiles for his room for along time. I made him an American flag mobile earlier in the summer and decide to add a fish one to his room too.

We have a lot of sticks that fall from the trees in our backyard. JDaniel stores them in a beaver dam area behind some bushes. Whenever we need a stick, we just head into the dam and look for the right one.

Once we had found the right one, I spray painted it white and red to look like coral.

A simple wash of water and glue was applied to multi-colored tissue squares. The squares were then placed all over water bottles that had the back third of them twisted to form a fish tail.

When we had applied enough tissue, we added giant wiggly eyes to the fish. Later when they had dried I added a piece of fishing line to each fish and hung the fishing line from the branch.

One night a few day later we put glow sticks in the fish to make them bioluminescent. JDaniel love having his Pout-Pout Fish glowing fish mobile in his room.

Starfish Math Game

We are trying to work on some basic math and reading skills this summer. One of the skills we have been working on is counting to ten.

To practice JDaniel and I sat down with some starfish game boards, pom poms, and a die. We each got to take turns rolling the die and adding pom poms to our starfish. The first person to get to ten was done and had to help the other person fill up the circles on their starfish.

Here are some of my favorite Posts from last week’s Read.Explore. Learn. link up:

I love this Nemo fish created by Colorful Imaginations.

Make Way for Ducklings is one of my favorite books. I love everything School Time Snippets did to explore and extend the book. The math lesson below looks like a lot of fun.

If you like these Pout-Pout fish book extension activities, you will like these fish activities for kids:

Fish Flop Painting

Shark Games -Fish Hockey

Zombie Goldfish Optical Illusion Activity

Polar Ice Fish Science Experiment

Olympics for Kids- 12 Olympic Related Activities and Meals

August 12, 2012 By Deirdre

As you have seen during the last three weeks, I have been a little excited about the Olympics and sharing them with JDaniel. I thought I would share with you all the posts I have written about this Olympics for kids this summer.

Olympics for Kids Activities and Meals

Food Creations

Olympics for Kids- 12 Olympic Related Activities and Meals

The Olympic Symbols were displayed in a bento box in a post called Olympics for Kids: Olympic Symbols Snack.

There was a gold medal meal that featured a fruit strip and cookie gold medal. There was also a cheese popcorn torch in that meal.

As part of a Bento Bloggers Olympic Hop, I shared an Elympic themed bento snack based on the book Elympics.

I shared an edible Olympic torch creation on the Kid’s Activities blog.

There was a Fruit Filled Olympic Ring Breakfast that was a hit with JDaniel.

Finally I created a British Flag Fruit Creation that was filled with fruits I knew would earn a gold medal with JDaniel.

Olympic Values Series

The first post in the series was called Olympic Values: Respect and focused on self respect and knowing one’s limit.

The second post was called Olympic Values: Growing Excellence and was about doing your best.

The final post in the series looks at the Olympic Values: Friendship and I talked about JDaniel’s working on making new friends.

Crafts and Learning Activities

Olympics for Kids- 12 Olympic Related Activities and Meals

The two activities in the top row are from posts I wrote for the Kids Activities Blog. The first activity is called Olympics of Kids: Color Sorting and the second is called Olympics for Kids: Laurel Wreath.

The first post in the second row Olympics for Kids: Two Torch Painting Projects was a lot of fun to create with JDaniel.

The second post in the second row Olympics for Kids: Long Distance Biking could have been called Getting Him to Ride to a Shadow. JDaniel rode from tree shadow to tree shadow in this post.

If you try any of these activities, please leave me a comment below telling me which one you selected.