Supplies

1-liter soda or water bottle

Sharp knife

2 wooden spoons

Small eye screw

Twine or string for hanging

Instructions

Start by drawing a 1/2-inch star on the side of a 1-liter bottle, about 4 inches from the bottom. Rotate the bottle 90 degrees and draw another star
2 inches from the bottom. Draw a 1-inch-wide circle opposite each star.

Use a knife to slit the star lines and cut out the circles (parent’s job). Insert a wooden spoon handle first through each hole and then through the opposite star.

Remove the bottle cap and twist a small eye screw into the top of it for hanging.

Finally, fill your feeder with birdseed, recap it, and use a length of twine to hang it from a tree.

Valentine’s Day is the perfect occasion for crafts—after all, nothing says you care like a gift that’s homemade.

This is a sweet craft your loved ones will appreciate because it will tell them “I Love You” in sign language every time they look at it.

How to make it:

Construction paper for background
Construction paper and trace the child’s hand and cut out
Heart shaped doily or heart cut from construction paper

1. Trace child’s hand and cut out
2.  Glue hand to the background
3.  Gently curl the middle two fingers down and glue to the heart
4.  Present it to your Valentine.

Every year parents and children end up in emergency rooms with cuts that occurred while carving pumpkins to make Halloween decorations. Pumpkin carving can be safe if parents handle the carving and leave other jobs to the children. Parents who want to share the joy of making jack-o’-lanterns with their children can use the following tips to find safe ways to involve kids when making carved pumpkins.

Pick Pumpkins for Jack-o’-Lanterns

Getting children involved with pumpkin carving begins before the actual carving ever starts. To share the joy of making autumn and Halloween decorations, parents can begin by letting children pick the size and shape of pumpkin that will be made into a jack-o’-lantern.

Take a family trip to a pumpkin patch or farmer’s market and let kids have free range to explore the different shapes of pumpkins that are available. Kids tend to pick the biggest and most expensive pumpkins so set a dollar limit in advance or set a rule that the child must be able to lift (but not carry) the pumpkin he or she wants. Decide how many pumpkins the family will carve together.

Choose Carving Stencils or Carving Designs

Once the perfect pumpkin has been found, parents can help children decide what the carving will look like. For a more old-fashioned pumpkin-carving experience, kids can draw a face or design on the pumpkin. Use washable markers so the children can have more than once chance to get the design just right.

For children who prefer a specific look for their pumpkin, a carving stencil can be used. Many websites offer free carving stencils of different skill levels. Select a theme for the pumpkins or let kids pick the carving stencils that appeal to them.

Get Kids Involved with Carving Stencils

Families who are using stencils to create carving designs have additional opportunities to involve kids in pumpkin carving. Kids can hold the stencil while mom or dad tapes it down on the pumpkin. Kids can also help parents mark the carving designs onto the pumpkin.

When using pumpkin stencils, the carving design is taped to the pumpkin and then holes are punched along the lines of the carving design to create cut lines in the pumpkin. Kids can use the hole puncher that comes with pumpkin carving kits while parents mark holes using a nail or an awl. Working together, mark all the lines of the carving design. After all the lines are marked, kids can help by rubbing flour or baby powder over the surface of the pumpkin to make the holes stand out better. Rub the pumpkin with a towel or washcloth to remove the extra flour. After parents cut the top or bottom off the pumpkin, kids can use a large spoon to scoop out the pumpkin seeds. This messy job is perfect for young children.

Carving Pumpkins Safely

Kids should never carve their own pumpkins and most experts agree that parents should not use knives to carve pumpkins. According to the American Society for Surgery of the Hand press release, “Hand Surgeons Urge Parents to Review Hand Safety Tips Before Carving Pumpkins this Halloween,” using a larger and sharper knife can cause the knife to become wedged in the thicker part of the pumpkin. Injuries occur when pulling the knife from the pumpkin or when the knife goes through the pumpkin and into the hand holding the pumpkin stable.

Pumpkin carving kits include safer alternatives to kitchen knives. Pumpkin carving saws require less force to pierce the pumpkins than a serrated or a plain kitchen knife, the ASSH reports. Even though pumpkin carving saws are safer, they should not be used by children

Preserve the Carved Jack-o’-Lanterns

Once the parent has completely cutting out the carving design, kids have an opportunity to be involved once more. Kids can rub all the cuts with petroleum jelly to help preserve the carved pumpkin. Kids who don’t like to touch petroleum jelly can use a basting brush to cover all the cuts with vegetable oil instead.

Parents don’t have to abandon making jack-o’-lanterns with children as long as they find creative ways to involve the children. Kids can pick pumpkins, choose the carving stencil or draw a carving design, mark the carving design on the pumpkin and help with preserving the carved pumpkin. Never let children use knives or pumpkin carving tools.

Just discovered this craft in a book and had to share. This looks fun and it will be something you can keep for years to come. These photos are from the original article, but I will be trying this with my kids and posting the results soon!

Ghosts and Jack-O’-Lanterns Wreath

The diameter of the completed wreath is about 15 inches.This craft is fun for older children (and adults!) – Age 6+.  There are quite a few steps that younger kids (Age 2+) can help with, but they won’t be able to do the craft independently.  This is a good family project!

This fun Halloween wreath is made with, you guessed it, TP ROLLS!!  Everyone in my family has been collecting them for me and we ended up with a whole bunch of extra ones.  I was stumped for a way to use them!

Materials:
Wire coat hanger
14 to 16 tp rolls
Optional:  Halloween color paint like white, orange or black
white and orange construction paper (you could also use craft foam or white paper painted or colored… )
tape
glue
scissors

Instructions:

ADULT:  Take each tp roll and cut a slit HALFWAY through.
Optional:  Paint tp rolls a neutral color.  You can see from the finished craft that not much shows through, but my kids have fun painting, so we painted them all brown.
Let dry.

ADULT:  Bend the coat hanger to form a circle.
Using the slits cut halfway through the rolls, slide each of your tp rolls onto the hanger to form a big circle of tp rolls.
Optional:  Take a bit of masking or scotch tape and tape the tp rolls together.  (tape the openings of the tp rolls on the inside of the circle together).  This will keep the rolls from spinning around while you’re working.  If you choose not to do this, the paper leaves will keep everything from spinning on the finished craft

Cut out many ghost and pumpkin shapes.  We folded the construction paper in half and in half again and traced our shapes onto the top.  Then we cut out the shape from the folded paper and got 4 at a time.
I’ve provided a template you can choose to trace.  We just freehand cut our own!
One person can be doing this part while another is assembling the tp roll wreath base.

We drew faces on the ghosts with black marker.
We glued green construction paper leaves and stems on the pumpkins and drew faces on with marker.
Glue all the characters onto the tp roll base, overlapping so it’s nice and full.
Tie a bow on the top if you want to.

Hand Print Flower Bouquet.

Another school year will come to a close this June for Contra Costa County students. Now is a good time to think about a small gift your child can make for the teacher who invested so much in their learning. Teachers help kids grow, so show your appreciation by helping your children make a handprint flower garden on a t-shirt or blank canvass bag.

Materials:
Blank T Shirt, Canvass Bag, or Large Paper
Acrylic paint
Paintbrushes

This is a fun and easy craft for younger children, but kids of all ages will enjoy making something special for their teacher. Use the paintbrush to paint your children’s hands with a thick layer of paint. Each hand print will be one flower. I suggest using multiple colors for a colorful flower garden. After making three or four handprint flowers, wash your child’s hand and allow them to draw stems on the flowers and grass below.

When all of the flowers are made, use the fabric paint to write a caption that reads “Teachers Make Small Things Grow” or “Teachers Help Children Grow”.

Hand print rainbow-Just in time for St. Patrick’s Day- make a hand print rainbow with your children! Add something special and give them a few chocolate coins to fill the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.

What you will need: There are different ways to do this craft you can use-

Rainbow colors of paint
Rainbow colors of paper (construction paper)
Rainbow colors of craft foam
White craft paper
Craft glue

Instructions for the project-Have each child trace seven handprints. Keep in mind that smaller children may need help with this step. Then they can cut out the handprints, from the construction paper, or craft foam. If the child is using paints they can paint their hand with each color, and then press it firmly on the paper. After the paint is dry they can then cut it out. Keep in mind that if you are working with the paints, you will need to have several adults on hand to supervise. When you are finished each child should have a handprint in each of the following colors: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet).They will then glue the handprints in a rainbow shape across their white craft paper.

These crafts will give you some fun inspiration for decorations, gifts, or just something fun to enjoy with your family before Christmas.

Made from your child’s footprint and handprints this Hand and Footprint Reindeer is a great way to capture a memory of when your children are so small.  This is a great Christmas craft to make year after year and then to display them all so you can watch how the reindeer grow!  It’s easy enough for even very young children to do and makes a great homemade Christmas gift or even Christmas card for grandparents and family.
Supplies

Light brown paper
Dark brown construction paper
2 googly eyes
Red pom pom
Scissors
Glue

Instructions

Trace your child’sfoot onto the dark brown construction paper and cut it out.
Trace both of your child’s hands onto the light brown construction paper and cut them out.

Glue the two handprints (at the wrist portion) to the back of the footprint (up near the toes) to be the antlers.
Glue two googly eyes onto the footprint.

Glue the pom pom onto the heel of the footprint as a nose.

This craft is reprinted courtesy of AllKidsNetwork.com.

Christmas Tree Sun Dazzlers

• You will need a Christmas tree cookie cutter, green felt, hole punch, plastic beads, glue and a ribbon for hanging.
• Trace the cookie cutter onto the green felt.
• Cut out the shape and punch holes where you want the “ornaments” to be.
• Fill the holes by gluing plastic beads into the holes.
• Hang in a window to catch the sunlight.

Brown Paper Christmas Stalking

Supplies needed:

• Thick brown paper (like grocery bag paper) or brown felt
• Pencil
• Scissors
• Glue
• A holepunch
• Yarn
• Markers or crayons

Step 1: Draw a large stocking on thick brown paper (or brown felt).

Cut out two copies of this stocking.

Glue the two stockings together around the edges (make sure you don’t put any glue along the top opening).

Punch holes around the edges of the stocking.

Weave yarn in and out of the holes. Leave a loop of yarn at one end, and tie it in a knot.
Decorate your stocking with crayons, markers, stickers, construction paper cut-outs, or glitter.