January Crafts February Crafts Valentines Day and Chinese New Year crafts

July 8, 2016July 8, 2016 admin

January Kids Craft Club: Fancy Frames

Craft supplies to make fancy picture frames

Have some fantastic drawings or photo memories from 2011? Put them in a fancy frame! The January Kids Craft Club package includes all the supplies your tot needs to make a selection of photo frames to show off their artwork or pictures. It’s like art within art! Join the Kids Craft Club before January 23rd to get your Fancy Frames package. Easy for you and fun for your kids, the Kids Craft Club sparks creativity with new eco-friendly crafts every month.

February Kids Craft Club: Treasure Boxes

Make Treasure boxes with these craft supplies

The February Kids Craft Club package is brought to you by the colours Red, Pink and Purple! February is all about treasures that are close to the heart, and about getting special mail, so we thought some Treasure Boxes were in order. Assemble materials into a keepsake box, mail container, or piggy bank, and decorate with a selection of colourful craft supplies and hearty shapes. Start your Kids Craft Club subscription with the February crafts by noting ‘February’ in your order. Subscribe here.

Valentines Card Making Kits Available Now!

Get started on a fun craft project that can keep the kids entertained all month long – make handmade Valentines! Our most popular card kits, these seasonal Valentine kits come with either Construction or Critters themes. Choose from a 24 card class pack, or an 8 card/envelope pack. Use code ‘craftyvalentines’ to receive 8 bonus Valentine stickers with your class pack of cards. View Card making Kits

Chinese New Year: Year of the Dragon Mask

Chinese New Year is January 23rd and it’s the year of the Dragon! Kids can join the celebration by making this super cool Dragon mask and then leading their very own Dragon dance. Find the instructions on our blog.

Chinese New Year – 3 Dragon Puppets to Make

January Craft Idea for kids Year of the Dragon

We played around with paper bags, toilet rolls, craft sticks and scissors, and came up with three fun dragon crafts. Use our dragon template to make a paper bag puppet dragon, practice shape recognition while you work, or use toilet paper rolls for a dancing dragon. Find the craft instructions and puppet template here

Valentines Day Craft Ideas

source: random-mom.com

We’ve started a collection of Valentine Craft Ideas on our latest crafty pin board. Stay tuned over the month as we add more! While you’re at it, check out more Chinese New Year ideas too!

Valentines Cards, Valentines crafts, and kids parties made easy

July 7, 2016 admin

Puppet Master – February Kids Craft Club

Chinese New Year crafts and Valentines Crafts

Chinese New Year Crafts, Valentine’s Day Crafts from the Kids Craft Club! If you’re not already in the club, there’s ten days left to subscribe for this craft package.

In China, the lunar new year will be celebrated with Chinese New Year on February 3rd. Dragon dances and lion dances are often part of Chinese New Year celebrations. Make your own dancing puppet this month with the Kids Craft Club . Just like the ones you see on parade, make your brightly coloured puppet shake and shimmy from head to tail!

Then make a ‘hearty’ Valentine’s box that will be just what you need to collect Valentines from friends and family!

Subscribe by January 23rd to receive this craft package at the beginning of January.

Make Valentines Cards – It’s only a Month Away!

Yes it’s true, the next exciting kids ‘holiday’ is a mere month away. Instead of getting caught at the last minute, scribbling names onto Valentine’s cards, choose one of our Valentine Card Making kits for immediate shipping, so that your kids can work on their one of a kind Valentines well in advance of the big day! Choose ‘Critters’ or ‘Construction‘ themed cards in packages of 8 cards with matching envelopes, or 24 mini cards for the whole class.

Simple Party Planning with Themed Party Crafts

Kids Craft idea for parties - crown craft

Planning a party in winter can often seem burdensome – the Christmas holidays have just ended and are usually exhausting for parents and caregivers. Make your winter party planning a little easier by choosing one of Craft Caravan’s New party crafts. Whether you’re planning for a houseful of super heros or a palace of princesses, our party crafts will make your party a little more simple to plan, and a lot more fun for the kids!

**Your party crafts can be personalized with bright letters to spell the name of each child! Your party guests will love decorating a craft with their name on it

Crafty Idea – Message in a Bottle

Message in a Bottle craft, recycling craft

This is a fun craft idea for a special Valentine or just ‘because’, and it’s a great way to repurpose your recyclables too!

Supplies: clean jar or bottle from the recycle bin, coloured tissue paper, glue, scissors, piece of writing paper, something to write with, ribbon, sponge or cotton swab

To prepare: Make sure your jar is clean and dry before starting. Pour a small amount of glue into a shallow bowl or old plastic lid. You may want to thin the glue by mixing 2 parts glue with 1 part water, for easier application. Cut tissue into squares that measure about 5cm x 5cm (2” x 2”).

Decorate your bottle: Dip your sponge or cotton swab into glue and dab onto a small area of the bottle. Cover glue with tissue. Dab another area with more glue, and add new tissue squares. Continue covering small patches of the bottle with glue and then tissue until the bottle is entirely covered with tissue. If there are any dry corners of tissue that are not entirely stuck to the bottle, simply dab a little glue on top and press into place.

Tip: Your finished bottle doesn’t have to be perfectly smooth! You can give your bottle more texture by placing tissue onto the glued area and then pushing tissue onto itself, creating some bumps.

Write your Message: put a special message on your writing paper, roll up the paper, and tie it with a ribbon. Carefully insert the message into your bottle so that it’s possible to pull the message out again. Give your message in a bottle to someone special

Crafty Idea – Heart Book Mark

Here’s a simple craft idea that your kids can make for their favourite bookworm. Pop it in an envelope and put it in the mail as a special Valentines surprise!

Supplies: red, pink, or other construction paper, decorating supplies, scissors, glue, ribbon of any width and ~15 cm in length

Cut two medium sized hearts from the construction paper and decorate the hearts. If you’re giving the bookmark to someone, you may want to write a special message on the hearts. Once the hearts are decorated, put the end of the ribbon at the point of one heart so that it hangs down from the heart. Glue the second heart on top of the first, so it catches the end of the ribbon in place. Cut two small sized hearts and sandwich them at the end of your bookmark. You’re finished!

Card Kit Giveaway – Construction Valentines Card Making Kit

Construction Themed card making kit for kids

Congratulations to Visakha, who won this month’s card making kit draw from our homepage! We’ll be contacting Visakha by email to get shipping information for your Valentines Card Making Kit! You can enter next month’s draw here.

Be sure to join our Facebook page and follow our Twitter feed as well – for quick craft ideas, interesting articles, and giveaways

Kids Craft Ideas for February 2008

June 29, 2016 admin

Directions: Turn your toilet paper roll into a little man by adding googly eyes, glitter glue nose, and heart-shaped mouth. Add a hearty bow tie by gluing the points of two hearts together, just below the mouth. Add ears by folding two hearts in half, and gluing the back-side of the hearts into ear position – the hearts will fold out to create flappy ears. Punch holes in toilet roll using end of pen or pencil, and insert the pipe cleaner arms. Make hands by gluing two hearts back to back, catching the end of the arm in between. Lay the ‘feet heart’ flat and stand the Hearty Man over the point, gluing to create two feet. Finally, make hair by bundling the 5 rolled tissues, stuffing into the top of the toilet paper roll, and fanning out to make ‘bed-head’ hair.Note: Turn you little man into a super hero by cutting a heart-shaped cape, adding the crafter’s initials, and gluing the tip of the heart cape to the back of the manBefore Mass-Production Step back in time this year and make handmade Valentine’s cards. The tradition of giving Valentine’s Day cards dates way back to the Middle Ages. At that time, Valentine’s wishes were sung or read as poetry. Written letters and cards slowly replaced the spoken greetings. Hand made cards were often created using coloured paper, watercolours, inks, lace, and ribbons. Mass-produced Valentines were introduced around 1850; today there are roughly 1 billion Valentine’s cards sold every year.Word PlayNeed some catchy phrases for Valentine’s cards? Take a look at these classics (from those early 1800’s Valentine’s): “To My Valentine”
“Valentine’s Greetings”
“Happy Valentine’s Day”Want to spice it up a bit? Choose a kid-friendly theme to say it all, or be inspired by our Construction or Critters themes:“I Choo Choose You” (Train)
“You’re the Write Type” (Book)
“You’re a Hoot” (Owl, from Critters Kit)
“I Dig You” (Excavator, from Construction Kit)Five Minute Fun- Heart Shaped MessagesMake mundane tasks more fun by decorating cleaning supplies with heart-shaped labels. The kids can cut out hearts (or you can help them) to decorate and affix (with supervision) to dish detergent, laundry soap, or even the vacuum. The next time you put yourself to work, you will see their testimonials of love and smile!

February is Brought to You by the Colour….

RED does double duty this month; the Chinese New Year begins on February 7th and is celebrated with an abundance of red – Dragons, Lanterns, and red envelopes of ‘lucky money’. Valentine’s Day means hearts a plenty, and what better colour than red? Get out the red paper and the scissors, and try these fun February crafts:

Chinese New Year Lantern:

Supplies: Construction paper, scissors, tape, decorating supplies (such as crayons, markers, stickers, glitter glue, etc)

Directions: Use decorating supplies to create abstract design on your paper. Fold the paper in half length wise, and draw cutting lines that are 2 cm apart, starting at folded edge, and stopping ~ 2.5 cm from open edge. Cut along lines, making sure to stop at stop line. Unfold the paper and match short ends together, taping in place to create a lantern. Add a handle by cutting a strip of construction paper and securing with glue or tape

“Bed-Head” Hearty Man

Supplies: 5 pieces of facial tissue (folded in half and rolled up), toilet paper roll, construction paper for hearts (1 for mouth, 2 for ears, 2 for bow tie, 4 for hands, and 1 large heart for feet), googly eyes, 2 pipe cleaner pieces for arms (~ 5 cm each), glitter glue or marker, pen or pencil

Crafty Idea: Three Ways to Make Dragon Puppets for Chinese New Year

June 16, 2016 admin

2012 is the year of the Dragon. Here are three Dragon puppet ideas you can make at home, daycare, or preschool:

1. Paper Bag Dragon Puppet Craft

Dragon Puppet Template for Chinese New Year Kids Dragon Craft

Supplies: red paper bag, red, orange, black, and white paper, orange tissue. Dragon puppet template

Step 1: Make your paper bag look ‘dragony’ by cutting the bottom edge into a jagged zig zag.

Step 2: Cut dragon pieces using dragon template. Use red for the dragon mouth and largest circles, orange for ears and medium circles, black for small circles, eyebrows, and nostrils. Cut zig zag strips of white teeth

Step 3: Glue dragon eyes to front of bag flap. Glue ears to the back side of the puppet.

Step 4: Make dragon mouth. Glue nostrils to the ends of mouth shape. Open mouth and glue strips of teeth to top and bottom. Crumple a piece of tissue and glue it to the centre of mouth, to make a fire breathing dragon

Step 5: Lift flap of bag and add glue to the underside of flap, on top and bottom. Push folded end of dragon mouth into glued area of flap and then squeeze the flap together so mouth is firmly pressed onto puppet . Let your craft dry.

2. Dragon Craft with Basic Shapes

This is a good one if you want to practice cutting and basic shape identification. Use small, medium, and large circles for eyes. Use Large triangles for dragon mouth. Use medium triangles for spikes on the back of your dragon’s head. Use small triangles for sharp teeth. Rectangles are used for eyebrows. Can you use other shapes to make your dragon even more unique?

Dragon puppet craft for Chinese New Year

3. Toilet Roll Dragon Stick Puppet Craft

Year of the Dragon Chinese New Year Craft for kids

Supplies:

Red poster paper (we used dark pink 11×14 paper)

Toilet paper rolls

2 large craft sticks

Tissue squares and other decorating pieces

Markers, crayons or pencil crayons

Scissors

Step 1: cut long edges of poster paper into scalloped edge, and decorate entire paper with tissue squares and other decorating pieces

Dragon Craft for Kids using rainbow tissue paper

Step 2: make a slit in the ends of 2 toilet rolls so the craft sticks can slide in. Secure them with tape

How to use Toilet paper rolls for dragon craft

Step 3: Glue the toilet rolls to the underside of decorated poster paper. Leave some space between rolls so your dragon will be able to move. We used 3 toilet rolls in total, but it probably would work even better to cut the rolls in half and use 3 halves instead. This will create more space between each roll so your dragon can twist and turn more easily

Dragon Dance craft for Lunar New year

Step 4: Cut a dragon head from poster paper. Decorate the head in the same way you decorated the body. Flip your dragon body right-side up and glue head to body. Now you can make your dragon dance by moving the craft sticks back and forth!

Crafts for Kids Dragon Craft with rainbow colours