Spring Crafts

Spring Wall Banner - These banners are really fun for the kids to do. They also make a pretty nice decoration to hang up in honor of Spring and save year after year. Even the youngest crafters can glue the Spring objects on the banner! Directions...

Handprint Flowers - Dip child's hand in paint and stamp near the top of a piece of construction paper. This is the bud or flower part of the flower. Now stamp the child's feet to make the leaves. Draw in a stem. Don't forget to date it!

Cut Flower Stamps - Gather a variety of flowers. Dip flower in paint and stamp it onto paper.

Toilet Paper Roll Windsock - Paint a cardboard toilet paper roll any color desired and let dry. Decorate any way you want with stickers, glitter, etc. Punch 4-6 holes in one end with a hole punch. Thread through long pieces of yarn and tie off.

Cloud Pictures - You'll need a sheet of blue construction paper, glue stick, and white paper towels. Tear the paper towel into shapes to make them look like clouds and then glue them onto the blue sky (the blue construction paper). If your younger child is having trouble making the connection between the craft and the clouds in the sky -- take them outside and lay down in the grass with them. I guarantee they'll remember the day you laid down in the grass and looked at the clouds together for a long, long time.

Duck Feet Painting - A spring art activity that I have used often with toddlers and preschoolers that they really enjoy is "Duck Feet Painting". We fill a tray with some yellow paint and use spatulas to make the webbed footprints on the paper. Playing or singing spring/duck songs during the activity reinforces the "duck" theme. Ex. Six Little Ducks, 5 Little Ducks, etc. -- Submitted by Tracy

Potted Tulips - Cut a tulip shape out of construction paper and glue it to the end of a large craft stick. Cut a slit in the bottom of a strofoam cup and push the craft stick through so that it looks like the tulip is growing out of the "pot". You can turn this into a learning project by talking with your child about all the things that a tulip needs to grow. Then push the tulip down into the "pot" and slowly push it back up to pretend it's growing.

Frog on a Lilly Pad - Tint some cream cheese blue and spread on an english muffin half. Put a slice of cucumber on top for the lilly pad. Put a gummy frog on top of the cucumber.

Blossom - Simple craft for young children - need twig or stick (even more fun if child finds twig themselves). Cut up tissue paper into small pieces (use white/pink or crimsom depending on what colour blossom you want). Pour small amount of PVA glue in bowl and cover work surface before starting!!! Scrunch up each piece of tissue paper and dip in PVA glue - stick tissue paper onto twig to create blossom and allow to dry. I have done this craft every spring now with my kids and also at a mother and toddler group (I had to collect 40 twigs for that) and all the kids love it. ~ Submitted by Julie

Shona's Instant Plastic Flowers - These are great little flowers made from staws and plastic bags... and they were invented by a four year old! My four year old absolutely loved making them too! We experimented with all kinds of things once we got started with the idea. We recycled Walmart bags, grocery store bags, etc., used fancy scissors (you know, the ones that make designs when you cut with them), we even used colored tissue and coffe filters!

Baggie Butterflies - This craft was also send in by a visitor. Fill a sandwich bag with scraps of tissue paper, aluminum foil, or colored cellophane. Don't over fill. Gather the bag around the middle with a pipe cleaner to make the body and twist the ends to make the antennae.

In Like A Lion - A simple toilet paper tube lion. Print out either the black and white or the color template, cut out, and glue onto a toilet paper tube.

Paper Bag Windsocks - Cut the bottom off of a lunch sized paper bag and decorate any way you choose. Glitter, construction paper pieces, stickers, and tissue paper all work nicely. Create a handle for the windsock out of construction paper or use a piece of yarn tied to opposite sides of the top edge. Staple crepe paper streamers around the end of the bag opposite of the handle.

Egg Carton Tulips - Would Spring crafts with kids be complete if we didn't make tulips out of egg cartons? This link goes to a site where they do a good explanation and have great pictures of what they are "supposed" to look like.

Paper Plate Streamer Rings - I don't have a good title for this little craft, but the kids enjoyed playing with it. Cut the middle out of a paper plate so that you have a ring. You can decorate the ring if you want to, but it's really not necessary. Then staple crepe paper streamers around three quarters of the ring on the outside. The kids then hold onto the ring at the spot without any streamers and run in the breeze. You can also use ribbon, strips of paper, or yarn instead of streamers.

How To Make Balloon Plants - This is a very unique project where you actually grow radishes inside of a balloon. My kids would never eat a radish, so I'm going to try a different kind of seed to see if it will work.

Grow Birdseed - An anonymous visitor submitted this activity for Spring. Soak a sponge in water and put it in the middle of a plate with water. Sprinkle the sponge with birdseed (not sunflower seeds). Put the plate and sponge in a sunny location, keep water in the plate, and wait for the seeds to sprout.

Inkblot Butterfly - Fold a piece of construction paper in half and cut out a butterfly shape. Open it up and paint one side of the paper. Fold it over and rub lightly, then unfold to create the butterfly. Let dry and then you can glue it to a large craft stick or tongue depresser so the kids can play with it. You can also go a step further and glue on antennae.

Muffin Flower Craft - Materials you'll need for this simple craft are a printer, glue, scissors, construction paper, and two muffin cups (the paper cups you make muffins or cupcakes in). This one is really easy and a lot of fun!

Grass Hair People - Draw a face on a styrofoam cup using paper, paint, markers, etc. Let dry if necessary. Fill the cup with a few small rocks for drainage and potting soil. Sprinkle grass seed and cover with a light layer of soil. When your grass grows, it will look like hair for the face on the cup. If it gets too long you can cut it with scissors.

Flowers Bookmarks - This craft is super simple for kids of all ages. Simply cut out pictures of flowers and glue them onto a bookmark sized piece of paper. We adapted this idea to create our own Spring flower pictures instead of bookmarks. Four year olds just don't have much use for bookmarks.

Fishing Pond - I did this project with my son because he had a fishing pole set with a magnet at the end of the fishing line to "catch" four plastic fish that came with the set. As you might imagine, it got kind of boring to catch the same four fish all the time... so we made a bunch of fish out of pipe cleaners by simply crossing the two ends of the pipe cleaners and twisting them to make a fish with a tail.

Then we created a large pond in the living room by laying out pieces of blue construction paper on the floor in a somewhat circular shape. We used long pieces of yarn to define the edge of the "pond" and a bucket from the sandbox to put our fish when we caught them. It was a great way to "go fishing" on a rainy day.

You could make your own fishing poles by using a cardboard tube from wrapping paper. Use a piece of yarn or string for the fishing line and tie it to one end of the tube. Then tie a magnet to the other end of the line (a refridgerator magnet would work well if there is a way to tie it on the fishing pole).

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