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Keeping kids busy while they are at home can be a challenge.
While it’s easier to plop them in front of the television or allow them to get lost in their devices, we know that they need more than just the internet to grow into smart, self-sufficient adults.
Arts and crafts are an easy way to lure your children out of their electronic trances. Children are naturally creative and most love to show off their artistic talents.
But what if you aren’t the artistic type? Are you having difficulty coming up with new and exciting projects to keep your kids’ attention?
This article will give you seven ideas for arts and crafts projects that your kids are sure to love.
Assemble all your art supplies and spend the afternoon creating memories that you’re kids will never forget!
1. Puffy Paint
Kids love texture and puffy paint is sure to delight in this aspect. While there are definitely different types of paint that you can purchase, this paint you make with your little one.
Not only do you give your child a fun way to create art, but they also get the pride of creating a new art medium too!
It’s actually really simple to make puffy paint. All you need is white glue, shaving cream, and food coloring.
You will need to assemble one small container for each color of paint that you want. You’ll also need a popsicle stick to stir the ingredients, paintbrushes, and thick paper to paint on.
You can create puffy paint by mixing equal parts of shaving cream and glue, then add your choice of food coloring until you get the desired color. If you leave it white, it’s perfect for puffy clouds.
Now that you have your paint ready, it’s time to create a masterpiece!
2. Pinwheels
For this project, you will need to gather up some straws, pushpins, colorful paper, and masking tape. This project is super easy to make and fast, so it’s great if you are crunched for time.
First, cut your paper into a perfect square. If you are using a rectangular piece of paper, simply fold one corner over until the top of the paper is perfectly lined up with the side and fold a crease.
Draw a line at the bottom of the fold-over and cut this bottom piece of paper off. Unfold the triangle, and voila, a perfect square.
Next, fold the opposite side over the other corner so that you have two fold lines down the middle of the square. Place a dot where they intersect. This is the middle of your square.
Cut a line through the paper about three-quarters of the way on each fold line towards the middle dot. Take one point and fold it towards the center without creating a crease. Skip the next point.
Continue to fold every other point towards the center until you have four points in the center. Holding carefully with your hands, pierce through each point and into the top of a straw behind the paper.
You can decorate your pinwheel or leave it as is. This project might only take a few minutes to create but it can be played with for hours!
3. Oil Pastel and Watercolor Resist Art
This simple painting technique is easy but the results are rewarding. All you need for this fun art project is some oil pastels, watercolor paints, paper (preferably cardstock), paintbrushes, and a pot of water.
Allow the child to use whatever oil pastels they want to draw a picture on the paper. After they are happy with their drawing, they need to paint over the pastels with watercolor.
There are no rules in art, so they are free to paint as many different colors on the paper as they want.
Because oil and water don’t mix, the pastel will show through underneath and beautiful contrast of colors will be the ending result.
Afterwards, you can use the remaining watercolor paint for a dozen different creative painting projects!
4. Cardboard GeoCities
Imagine creating a city of shapes and colors. With this project, you won’t have to imagine!
The supplies needed for this project include old boxes, scissors, acrylic paint, sponges, and glue or tape to hold the pieces together.
The first step is to cut out strips of varying width and lengths of the cardboard. Fold these strips into squares, rectangles, diamonds, and triangles and tape or glue the ends together.
Next, paint these shapes with acrylic paint. The more colorful, the better!
Lastly, stack these shapes into several different skyscrapers and glue or tape the pieces together. Put them next to each other and you have a beautiful geometric city.
5. Playdough Creatures
The ever-popular playdough can begin to get boring if you don’t add a little more interest into the mix. To keep kids engaged, you can use odds and ends around the house to create something new with playdough.
First, assemble as many of your craft supplies as you can find. These include googly eyes, buttons, beads, pipe cleaners, etc.
You can even add some fun to the playdough by mixing in some glitter or liquid scent to the dough.
Allow the children to use all the pieces that you’ve assembled to create their own version of playdough creatures. They can then share their creations with each other and laugh at the silly faces.
Conclusion
Arts and crafts are a great way to help your kids use their creativity and spend some off-screen time without all the whining.
These quick and easy projects are sure to please kids of all ages. You might even find that you enjoy them, too!