Paper Crafts for Children

Sorry I have not had much to post lately, we have had a busy few weeks that has kept me away from the paper crafts and the computer.

First of all I got a bit carried away with a fundraiser which was supposed to involve organising a donation based morning tea with friends and work mates. I thought it would be more effective over a number of days so I baked morning tea for two workplaces for the entire week. LOTS of baking but it was worth it, we raised a good amount for the charity.

Then I was working on our costumes for fun mid-winter event – a run involving lots of muddy obstacles. The children wanted me to brush my hair, and we thought that suited a lions mane – so we went as a lion and lion tamer. Lots of fun!

We’ve been on a bit of a dress up theme around here lately.

This is easy and fun, and very very handy as part of a dinosaur or monster costume

The hardest part of this one for us was to hang onto two empty tissue boxes. Once we had managed to save the boxes. We just cut some slits around the holes in the top of the boxes to enable some feet to push into the box. We painted the boxes and glued on some claws. The final step is to add some scrunched up pieces of paper into the boxes to make a nice comfy space for feet.

We approach any opportunity to dress up with enthusiasm, and usually lots of paper to make our costumes. This opportunity was to go as your favorite character from a book. There was no question who that was for our daughter – Will from Rangers Apprentice. That character called for arrows!

A bit of scavenging in the garden found the stalks from agapantha flowers – they are straight and easy to cut – perfect!

We cut a slot in each end of the stalk. At one end we slotted an arrow head cut from cardboard.

At the other end we cut a sort of feather shaped end from card. We also cut a shape in it to allow it to fit over the stalk. It is also pushed into the slot cut in the stalk.

Repeat a few times and some fabulous arrows. Not pictured here, but we also made a great bow from some plaited wool and a nice bendy bit of grape vine.

This craft also doubles as two party games, one of them is to make it, the other is to destroy it.

	Whenever you get hold of a plain paper bag – keep it for that craft that is sure to come along. Although for this one you can use any paper bag, it does not matter if it is printed.
	Cut pieces of tissue paper long enough to go around the bag and then fringe the strips by cutting half way into them along the long edge.
	Starting at the bottom, glue the stip onto the bag, leaving the fringing hanging. Repeat with more strips, overlapping them, until the bag is covered. Fill the bag with treats and also paper scrunched up to pad it. Add string to hang it with, if it does not already have handles.
	Hang up high and see if it takes longer to destroy than it did to make it. Ours took a while to destroy as the children had to throw balls to break it instead of using a stick.

We have been creating all sorts of arty crafty creations for our next newsletter, and inspired by what we were doing, our 10 year old came up with this. I reckon it is better than anything I did!

She started by folding and then ruling the paper into 8 sections. Then she drew a simple scribble on top. The lines from the grid and the curves from the scribble created lots of interesting shapes on the paper. That was the easy part – then she filled each section with a different pattern or design all in crayon. She also went over the lines with a black crayon to emphasize them and give a border to each shape.

The classic finger puppet has to be a papier mache one! It is pretty simple to make as long as you are not too fussy about details.

	The basic puppet is made with a roll of paper for the neck and then just a scrunched up ball of paper coated with a few stips of glued paper to make the rough head shape.
	Paint on some features.
	And for the simplest of puppet bodies just attach a piece of fabric like a scarf, to the neck with a rubberband. Simple is good!