Share your summer craft ideas for my kids!

[XUfan]

These are great!!!

Before I posted this, the only thing I could think of was those paper hats we made from newspaper when I was a kid!! You guys are wonderful!!!

[okaliedokalie]

I really like the jeans idea! Here are a few of my favorite crafts:

A different sort of vase - Cover an empty wine (or other fun shaped) bottle with bits of masking tape. Rub with black or brown shoe polish to create a "leather" look. Place tall dried grasses in it - or tall flowers.

Paint lightbulbs, wrap wire around the top to make ornaments

Marshmallow guns out of PVC a quick google search will show you how to make this $2 craft. (the kids will play all day long with that) This is an OUTSIDE toy!

Your grandson would probably like making armor & "weapons" out of cardboard & ductape... This kept my boys busy nearly every day one summer.

Try pressing flowers in the microwave. Make a "Tile sandwich" - A piece of ceramic tile, 4 layers of paper towel, a piece of 100% cotton sheet, flowers that you'd like to press, another piece of sheet, 4 paper towels, another tile - rubberband it together & microwave for 1-3 minutes depending on thickness of the flowers. Let cool. Tada! Instantly pressed flowers!

Make luminaries out of the pressed flowers. Take a baby food jar (or other glass jar) spread modge podge on it. Layer tissue paper & pressed flowers on the jar. seal with a final coating of modge podge.

Or make cards, bookmarks, gift bags & boxes, etc from the flowers.

Make your own screen print stencil for t-shirts. Take a needlepoint circle, stretch pantyhose across the face of it & "trap" the hose between the two circles. Screw it tight. Pencil out a design onto the hose. Using a brush, paint your "white spaces" with the modge podge (anywhere you don't want paint to come through). Let dry. Do a couple of layers of modge podge. Place on fabric, sponge fabric paint on the stencil. Lift stencil straight up carefully. Tada!

Fake spill - Yogurt cup or styrofoam coffee cup - mix enough glue to spill with a couple of drops of paint in an appropriate color. Spill onto wax paper. Set cup into middle of spill. Add "embellishments" (Straw/spoons/marshmallows) to make it look real. This takes a few days to dry.

Tie dye! Tie dye socks, underwear, t-shirts, bandanas, pillowcases, everything under the sun.

Pet Rocks. paint. googly eyes. yarn. glue. make new friends :)

Newspaper houses. Lay out a section of newspaper. Open it all the way up. Roll it up from corner to diagonal corner into a long tube. Secure with tape or glue. Make triangles out of these by stapling or taping 3 of them together. Construct more & more & more triangles out of them to build structures - think dome jungle gyms.

Alka Seltzer rockets - just a bit of water in a film canister with a piece of Alka Setzer tablet - secure lid. set down on concrete - pressure builds & then "pop" the lid flys off!

Glue assorted dried beans onto a piece of wood to make designs.

Marrionettes & sock puppets

Secret Safes - Empty wide mouth jar, put a toilet paper tube inside. Secure with clay. Pour dried beans, rice, cereal, legos, other small object around the outside of the tube. Put a thin layer of clay around the top of the "filler" so that it does not fall into the tube. Make a fake lable. Secure to jar. Tada! Instant safe!

Would you like more?

[marion10]

Buy Shrinky Dink plastic at any craft store. Get pictures of your kids ( 8x 10 works best). Have them lay the plastic on top of a picture and trace it with a color pencil or sharpie marker. Be sure to punch a hole in the top with a hole punch! The the kids can color in themselves and add name and date. Coloring books work well too for tracing. Shrink in oven and voila- "stained glass" Christmas ornaments.

[SyLph211]

Make a Nature Display: Go for a nature walk and collect items like leaves, twigs, flowers, rocks, and acorns. When you get home, take a shallow box (a cereal box works well) and cover with plain white paper, or the paper of a brown grocery bag. Cut the front of the box open, leaving a one-inch border frame. Glue lightweight items to the back of the inside of the box, and heavier items to the bottom. Kids can decorate the box, too.

Rainbow Art:
Have your kids create wonderful works of art with just a few crayons! All they need to start with is a sheet of plain paper. Have them color dense streaks of bright colors such as yellow, red, green, pink, orange, etc covering the whole sheet. Once they have covered the whole sheet of paper in bright patches of color, have them color over the whole thing using the side of a black or dark blue crayon so that the colors are no longer visible. Now show your child how to "draw" using a spoon handle, gently peeling off the top layer exposing the colors underneath.

Paper Towel Rain Makers:
Young kids love noise makers. Color, paint, and decorate paper towel rolls. Cover one end of a paper towel roll with waxed paper and close it off with a rubber band. Pour a handful or two of dried beans (split peas work well) in the open end, close open end the same as the other. Poke toothpicks through the rolls at different intervals to add a "rain shaker" sound.

Animal Jumble:
Using construction or white paper, ask each child to drawn a different body part of an animal, but to have their animal be a secret. For example, have one child draw the head, another draw the tail,
another the legs and so on. let the children pick the animal they want to draw. When they are done have then put the animal together with tape or glue. Have fun coming up with a name for the animal (monk-dog-lion-potamus).

Make Your Own Jigsaw Puzzle:
Have your child draw a picture, or find a nice one in a children's magazine. Glue the picture onto a piece of heavy paper or cardboard. After the glue dries, carefully cut or tear the picture into five or six large pieces, and have your child put it together again.

[RobininVT]

My daughter loves it when I make up a "scavenger list" of things she can find outside - like "a shiny rock", different colored leaves, etc. Then she can paste the items on paper and make a collage. It's fun!!

Thanks!!

[dtmom]

I have made slime with my 12 year old girls scouts as well as with my 5 year old girl scouts. Both groups loved it. We mixed the primary colors to make other colors in the rainbow. Both these groups love science projects. I find many of them by searching the internet for Kids science projects. I look for stuff all year long to keep give the girl scouts hands on activities.

What you need:

• 2 cups white glue (Elmer's or just white craft glue. Please make sure glue used is water soluble)
• 2 cups Water
• Food colorings
• 1 tsp. Borax

In a bowl, mix the glue, 1 1/2 cups of the water and food coloring. In a separate bowl, dissolve the borax in 1/2 cup of water. Add to the glue mixture. You will get a very thick clump of Slime where the two mix.
Now, get your hands in it! With clean hands, knead the Slime to get it to mix. This will take about 10 minutes or so, and is not very difficult as the Slime easily separates between your fingers. For a more slimy texture, add a bit more water and knead it in.

[chrallen]

I second the slime. I have made it with my preschool class and the loved it. I think it is fun to play with as an adult so hopefully the 12 year old will too.

You can add a little water to jello powder to make fun scented water colors.

You could do scrapbooks with pictures you have around the house, colored paper, and magazine photos.

They could make their own books again using magazine pictures, photos, or there own illustrations. You could give them a theme. Maybe the 12 year old would like to make a story book about/for the younger children.

Collages can also be fun. You can put out little scraps of anything you have lying around the house out paper, material, pom poms, even colored straws or food boxes/wrappers.

Seeing as I am used to working with little ones, it is hard for me to come up with much for a 12 year old. Anyway, hope this helps. It seems like you have already got some great ones.

[XUfan]

Wow!! Thanks for even more great ideas!! My file will be soooooo full by the time this game is over!

Like I said before, don't worry about the 12 year old getting bored with the crafts. She loves ANY crafts!!! Last year, I bought a huge bag of big wooden beads at a flea market. When all 3 kids were together, we made necklaces. BUT...she's gotten them out to create things several times since then!

BTW...she got home from school today at 3:30. It's the last day of school for the year. It's 7:30 now, and she's already bored!! The grandkids will be here tomorrow, so that will help!

[rbunnymom]

Hi,
I am running short on time, so did a quick google search for recycled crafts for kids and came up with this.


Trash to Treasures Craft Page, Recycled crafts, recycle, cardboard, pop bottles, boxes, cd cases

Lots of great ideas

[greenfrog57]

Coffee Filter art--
Use food coloring or washable markers to decorate coffee filters, then spray with water in a spray bottle -- make sure to do this project over a covered work area. Allow to dry. You can urn these into butterflies with pipe cleaners folded in half and twisted around the pinched middle of the dried coffee filter with the ends of the pipe cleaner to be the antennas.

My kids love turning craft sticks (or recycled popsicle sticks) into shapes/ornaments/picture frames with glue (hot glue works best with your help), markers to decorate, and a string/ribbon to hang.

My son loves using cotton balls to make/embellish a picture. The cotton can be clouds or sheep or even a white cat or poodle.

My kids both love scissors, and it is a treat to use them for a project. You can have them trace or draw shapes and cut them out. Then, take the shapes to make a picture.

Collages are also fun and cheap. Use plain paper or cut out old magazines to make regular collages or mosaics.

Have the kids write and illustrate a book.