Craft Ideas for July 2012: Sunshine crafts, beach activities, and Sunprint Paper

July 8, 2016July 8, 2016 admin

August Kids Craft Club: Here Comes the Sun

Join the Kids Craft Club to receive craft supplies for celebrating the summer sun!! Summers are never long enough here in Canada, so we’re capturing the sun while it shines. We’re sending Kids Craft Club members the supplies for everything sun -think sunflower, sun mobile, etc. Everything you need for sun inspired crafts is included in this craft package.

This month’s crafts are brought to you by the colours Orange and Yellow! Start your Kids Craft Club subscription with the August crafts! Join Kids Craft Club

Summer Craft Supplies – Sunprint Paper!

Sunprint Craft Kit for Kids Sun fade paper

We’re excited about this Sunprint Paper because it’s the perfect summer’s day craft project. All you need is the sunprint paper, some found items (such as leaves, flowers, blades of grass),water and the sun! Arrange special items on the paper, set it out in the sun, and watch your paper turn into a beautiful print! Each kit comes with 12 pieces of 10cm x 10cm Sunprint paper, and an Acrylic overlay to weigh down your paper while making prints. Get Sunprint Paper here

Sunprint Kit – $5.99

Kids Beach Activity: Squirt Gun Body Art

If you’re looking for a way to cool off at the beach or in the backyard, try this fun ‘body art’ activity. Squirt lines or dots of water onto legs and arms, cover with sand, and then shake the excess off. The crowd favourite at our beach outing was zebra (or tiger) stripes. A fun way for kids to play with squirt guns in the name of art!

New Pinboard: Summer Puppet Theatre

Kids Crafts Puppet Theater Handmade Puppets and Theater

Summer is a good time for the kids to sink their teeth into a larger-scale craft project they can go back to all summer long. Puppet theatres are a great creative activity – the kids can make the theatre and puppets, and then spend time creating and performing plays. We’ve pinned some of our favourites here.

Kids Craft Club Showcase – Submit Your Photos!

Our New and improved website comes complete with a rotating showcase of crafts and kids from the Kids Craft club. You can see kids at work or proudly showing off their creations in a gallery on the right-hand side of our site. Check it out here!

Is your child in the Kids Craft Club? Send us pictures of him or her with their artwork and we’ll add them to our showcase!

Customer Quote for monthly Kids Crafts

Kids Crafts for Spring and Summer, PlayMais, and Rhubarb!?!

July 8, 2016 admin

Get Buggy With It – June Kids Craft Club

Make an insect Mobile with this month's Kids Craft Club craft supplies

June Crafts – Worm Crafts and Insect Crafts from the Kids Craft Club! If you’re not already in the club, there’s only a few days left to subscribe for this craft package.

If you explore your backyard in June, you’ll notice a flurry of activity going on. You’ll have to look really really closely though, as all that busy-ness is coming from the little creatures that fly, float, or creep along outside.

This month, make worm and bug crafts with the Kids Craft Club craft supplies.

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

Summer Craft Supplies for Home or Travel

Craft Supplies for Summer Craft projects

Crafty activities for Camping, Road Trips, or in the backyard! We’ve put together a selection of craft supplies that will help the kids get crafty outside or on the go. This Summer Craft Package includes nature print paper, Wikki Stix, self-adhesive collage boards, and a pencil and doodle pad. Great open ended creative activities! Limited quantities, buy here

New to Craft Caravan –

Fish Craft using Playmais natural building toy

We’re excited to add PlayMais to our Eco Friendly Craft Supply selection. PlayMais is a biodegradable building toy made from a simple list of natural ingredients – corn, water, and food colouring. Simply stick pieces of PlayMais together with a little water. A great tactile crafting toy for kids who love to smush, squeeze, and build. Take a look at the Basic building box for craft time at home or daycare, or the Princess or Fish themed boxes, which are perfect alternatives to party goody bags or loot bags.

Kids Nature Crafts with Rhubarb

We happen to have an abundance of rhubarb in our yard this year, so I got thinking about ways to use rhubarb for craft time. Check out our suggestions here. Also find a great recipe for chocolate chip rhubarb loaf, which everyone in my family loves, even though they don’t love rhubarb

Card Kit Giveaway – Fun Messages Sticker Set

Congratulations to Joy, who won this month’s card making kit draw from our homepage! We’ll be contacting Joy by email to get shipping information for your Message Sticker Set. 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

May Crafty Ideas by Craft Caravan

July 7, 2016 admin

Summer Sunsets – June Kids Craft Club

Mark the first day of summer this June with two fun crafts from the Kids Craft Club! Make a summer sunset picture with shades of pink, yellow and orange – add some black shadows to create a perfect sunset! Then get ready for the ‘longest’ day of the year with a summer lantern craft. Hang your lantern in your room or carry it with you to celebrate long summer days fast approaching!

Subscribe by May 23rd to receive this craft package at the beginning of June

Fundraising Fun!

If your child’s group or organization is looking for ways to raise funds, book a card-making-kit fundraiser with Craft Caravan! A fundraiser that’s truly for the kids – raise funds and have fun! Visit our website or contact us for more information.

Crafty Idea – Magestic Eagle Craft

Spotting an eagle is a rare and exciting occasion, so we were thrilled to have three separate sightings on Saturday. Here’s a crafty idea drawn from our eagle sightings:

Supplies: toilet paper roll, 1 piece of facial tissue, elastic band, newsprint or cotton balls, brown, white, and yellow construction paper, googly eyes, glue, needle and thread (optional)

Directions:

Scrunch newsprint into a ball (or bunch cotton balls) and place in centre of facial tissue to make eagle head.
Position head at the end of toilet paper roll, and secure with elastic band. Cut 2 wings out of brown construction paper: cut an arc that is longer than toilet paper roll to make top edge of wings. Cut ‘feathers’ into bottom edge of wings. Glue wings onto toilet roll.

3. Cut tail feathers out of white construction paper and glue onto toilet roll. Cut beak from yellow paper, and glue beak and eyes onto head.

4. Optional: Poke holes into eagle body at top edge of wings and just before the tail. Loop string through and tie so that you can hang onto the string and make your eagle fly!

Simple Science – Colourful Flowers

My crafty kids noticed that the flowers they got me for Mother’s Day had turned the water pink! I explained that some flowers are dyed to change their colour, and they wanted to try this at home. Here’s how:

Mix 20-30 drops of food colouring into ~1 cup of water, and pour the mixture into a flower vase. Using a white flower, cut the bottom tip of the stem off, and place the flower into the water container. Let the flower sit and check back periodically to see if the colour has changed. This can take a whole day! The flower will slowly change colour as the water moves from stem to petals, showing how flowers ‘drink’ water from their base through to the flower tips.

Five Minute Fun – Dandelion Bouquet

No one really likes weeding, but collecting ‘wild flowers’ to make a bouquet is fun for everyone! Enlist the kids to help with the weeding by collecting a dandelion bouquet! The bouquet won’t last very long, but it looks pretty while fresh, and it guarantees that those nasty little seeds won’t be spreading!

Crafty Ideas June 2009

July 7, 2016 admin

School’s Out for Summer!

It’s hard to believe, but by the end of this month another school year will be over and the kids will be looking for things to do over the summer! Help them tap into their creative side with these ‘gearing up for summer’ crafts

Looking Back PlaceMat:

A fun project to showcase the highlights of the school year

Supplies: 2 pieces clear self-adhesive book covering (cut to ~ 8.5×11 or 9×12), items from the school year such as drawings, special projects and photos that can be cut for a keepsake collage. Other decorating supplies such as magazine clippings, glitter, or stickers.

Directions: Remove backing from first piece of book covering. Place your items on the sticky surface, being sure to spread them around so that they will be easy to see. Add other decorations such as sparkles or magazine clippings. Remember to include the year, a handprint, and child’s name (written by them if they can!) Once you have a collage that you are happy with, cover with second piece of self-adhesive book covering.

Tip: expand this reflective project idea by making an ‘About Me’ Scrapbook. Get the supplies here!

Did you try this craft? Send us your comments and photos!

Sidewalk Chalk Drawings:

A simple changing of the canvas (from concrete to construction paper) to keep sidewalk chalk interesting!

Supplies: black construction paper, coloured sidewalk chalk, sprayer bottle or squirt gun filled with water

Directions: Decorate the construction paper with sidewalk chalk drawings. Once your drawing is complete, lay flat and spray or squirt with water. Watch the colours blend together! Leave your picture to air dry. Tip: Work outside so you don’t need to worry about the mess.

Did you try this craft? Send us your comments and photos!

Kitchen with Kids – Super Smoothy Popsicles

Head the ice cream truck off at the pass by having these tasty treats ready in the freezer!

1 ½ cups apple juice or other fruit juice
1 cup strawberries, washed and hulled
2 bananas

Combine all ingredients in blender. Blend until smooth. Pour into popsicle mold and freeze until solid. To remove, run hot water over the popsicle you are removing, and gently pull out of mold.

Simple Science- Be a Bee

In your yard, use a feather duster to gently ‘dust’ from one plant to another. You will be helping spread pollen to make seeds and fruit! Pick a flower, such as a lily, rhododendron bloom, or iris, and carefully pull the flower apart to look at the reproductive system.

Five Minute Fun – Salad Container Bug Box

Plastic salad or tomato containers gain another purpose before hitting the recycling bin. Your child can add a few green leaves or grass clippings to the bin and then collect a few bugs to observe!

May 2009 Crafty Ideas

July 7, 2016 admin

Signs of Spring

May is the time of year when the outdoors starts buzzing with activity. Birds are chirping, bees are starting their collection ritual, and caterpillars are making big plans to become butterflies! Get inspired by nature this month!

Signs of Spring Collage:

Go on a walk with your little one and collect some signs of spring, then turn them into a collage. Some signs of spring to look for include puddles, rain clouds, spring flowers, blossoms, buds on trees, baby birds, caterpillars, and sprouts of new plants through the dirt.

Supplies: camera, doodle pad and pencil, magazine clippings, found objects from nature (nothing moving or living!), construction paper, glue, crayons or pencil crayons

Directions: On your nature walk, take photos of the signs of spring, or your child can draw what he or she sees as you walk. Collect small items that might work in your collage. At home, create a collage that includes your spring photos and drawings, magazine clippings of spring, and found objects.

Did you try this craft? Send us your comments and photos!

Coffee Filter Butterflies:

A simple craft that’s well worth being reminded about. Our kitchen window is currently home to a few of these little critters!

Supplies: Paper coffee fliters (basket style), colouring supplies such as crayons, pencil crayons, markers, chenille stems (pipe cleaners). Optional: decorating supplies such as glitter, pompoms, or paper scraps, glue

Directions: Spread the coffee filter out so it lays flat. Colour the filter using crayons, markers, or pencil crayons. Add decorations if desired. When filter is dry, carefully ‘scrunch’ filter at centre, pinching top to bottom. Filter should now look like two wings, with centre pinched in where a body will be. To make body, fold chenille stem in half. Twist the loop end together until half way up the length of folded stem. Twist tie around centre of coffee filter, and shape top ends of chenille stem into antennae.

Did you try this craft? Send us your comments and photos!

It’s All In The Details

The great outdoors has been the inspiration for many artists over the years, and proves to be quite complex when studied from up close. Georgia O’Keeffe, an American artist born in 1887, made many large-scale paintings of natural forms at close range, as if seen through a magnifying lens. On the next walk with the kids, find a new flower, a slow moving snail, or a bee who’s busy at work, and spend some time just watching, and talking about the little details that sometimes go unseen as we hurry by.

Kitchen with Kids – Rhubarb Strawberry Crisp

If you have your own rhubarb plant, the kids can help harvest a few stalks for this yummy treat. Otherwise, find rhubarb at local farmers markets and produce stores.

Filling:

4 cups rhubarb, chopped
2 cups strawberries, hulled and sliced
2 tbsp cornstarch
½ cup sugar

Topping:

1/3 cup flour
1 cup oats
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/3 cup soft butter

Mix filling in a greased 9×9 baking dish. In a separate bowl, mix dry ingredients for topping, cutting in the butter until crumbly. Spread on top of filling. Bake at 375 for 35 minutes. Serve warm, with ice cream.

Simple Science- What do Plants Need to Grow?

Plant one bean in planting medium or soil. Water, and keep it in a bright place (but not direct sunlight). Plant another bean in exactly the same manner, but keep it in a cool dark location (Like a cold storage room or a closet). Which one grows faster? What do plants need to grow?

Five Minute Fun – Dipping Dandelions

Do double duty by ridding the garden of dandelions, and using them for art! The fluffy yellow flowers might not be wanted in the yard, but they make great abstract art paint brushes. Pick a few and set out the paints so your kids can get busy with these unique tools

Craft Ideas by Craft Caravan – August 2008

July 7, 2016 admin

Go Play Outside!

The great outdoors is the perfect place to work on some wonderfully messy craft projects. Clean up is made easy with a simple wash of the hose, so gather up the craft supplies and go play outside! Try these crafts to get your outdoor artist’s studio started:

Home Made Sidewalk Chalk:

Supplies: Plaster of Paris, powdered tempura paint, stir stick, mixing container, water, waxed paper, paper coin rollers (quarter rollers). Optional: painters tape or masking tape.

Directions: Optionally tape over one end of the coin roller so that it has a ‘bottom’. Place on a cookie sheet covered with waxed paper, covered side down. Mix 1 cup of Plaster of Paris together with 2 tbsp paint. Add roughly 1 cup of water, stirring while you add, for smooth consistency. Carefully pour mixture into coin rollers. Let the chalk sticks set – approximately 2 hours. Peel back the coin roller paper to use.

Note: We were able to use our chalk after only 15 minutes of waiting. Keep the coin roller paper on for strength, peeling back as the chalk gets used.

Abstract Canvas Splash Art:

Supplies: art canvas, canvas board, or paper, liquid tempura paints, paint brushes or toothbrushes

Directions: pour paint into plates, bowls or other containers. Lay canvas or paper on the ground. Dip paint brush into colour of your choice, and let it drip onto canvas. Try swinging the paintbrush to make a bit splat! Dip toothbrush into paint and run finger over bristles, splattering paint onto the canvas. Repeat with different colours of paint, creating an abstract masterpiece.

Note: You can position items such as leaves, paper shapes, or other objects on the canvas before painting, and remove after splashing, to create shapes on the canvas.

Fun Facts – the Great Jackson Pollock

Splash art is not only for kids! Jackson Pollock painted for many years, and became an influential American artist because of his spontaneous paint dripping technique, leading the abstract expressionist movement. Paint brushes, sticks, and basting syringes were among the tools he used to drip his paints!

Fortunately Unfortunately

Summer time often means road trips, which can be a challenge with little ones in tow! Add word games to your car time repertoire to make the time pass by. You can play “I Spy” or counting games (we recently counted all the trailers passing us), or try a game of ‘Unfortunately Fortunately’. Start the game with ‘Unfortunately (fill in the blank)’, and let your child finish with ‘Fortunately (fill in the blank)’. For smaller kids, you can replace the ‘Unfortunatley fortunately with ‘Uh Oh’ and ‘That’s OK’. Example:

‘Unfortunately, we’re almost out of gas’
‘Fortunately, we’re going to a gas station!’

‘Uh Oh, I spilled on my sweater!’
‘That’s OK, we can wipe it up.’

Kids in the Kitchen – Frozen Banana Pops

These treats are a great summer time snack, and a snap to make with the kids!

4 bananas, cut in half cross wise
Yogurt (Flavour of your choice), or chocolate chips
Popsicle sticks, waxed paper, cookie sheet

Insert popsicle stick into flat end of banana. Dip each banana into yogurt. Place on cookie sheet covered with waxed paper. Freeze for approximately 3 hours. For chocolate banana pops – freeze plain bananas on sticks. Melt chocolate chips and drizzle onto frozen bananas. Chocolate will harden immediately. To store, wrap each banana pop in foil.

Five Minute Fun – Bubble Art

Turn your bubble blowing session into some great outdoor art! Simply add different colours of food colouring to bubble solution in dishes or jars, mixing or shaking well. In between blowing bubbles into the air, your kids can blow coloured bubbles down onto a piece of paper, creating their very own bubble art masterpiece!

Kids Craft Ideas for May 2008

June 29, 2016 admin

Gotta Hand It To You

Many mommies get a little sentimental around Mother’s Day, reminiscing about when they first entered into motherhood. Start tracking how big the kids have grown year after year, by making handprint tracings. They’re fun to look back on, and they also make great craft projects – check out our suggestions below. And just in case Mother Nature is planning another blast of cold weather, these handprint activities will make it feel like spring inside, regardless of what’s happening outside!

Mr. Sun Handprint Craft:

Supplies: Yellow and orange construction paper, marker, pencil, or crayon, glue, large circle template (a lunch plate would work well for this)

Directions: Using lunch plate or other circle template, trace circle onto yellow construction paper. Make sun rays: on orange construction paper, trace child’s hands (fingers spread), and cut out tracings. You will need at least 4 handprint cutouts. Repeat, using yellow construction paper. Glue handprint sun rays around yellow circle, alternating yellow and orange rays. Use marker or crayon to add a face to your handprint sunshine.

Simple Shapes Handprint Bird:

Help your child identify shapes and practice cutting as you make this little bird!

Supplies: Construction paper for bird (blue, red, brown, or yellow) and beak/feet (orange or yellow), googly eye, toothpicks, large circle template, small circle template, feathers, paper for background.

Directions: Use a circle template (such as lunch plate) to make bird body, and use a smaller template (such as drinking glass) to make head. Cut triangle for beak, and two small triangles for feet. Make the wing: trace child’s hand (fingers closed), so that the tips of the fingers become the tips of the wing. Assemble bird, gluing onto background paper. Use toothpicks for legs, adding triangle feet. Add googly eyes and decorate with feathers

Tip: paper from an old brown paper bag would work great for the bird’s body

All Sewn Up

The art of hand sewing dates back over 20 000 years. The first sewing needles were made of animal bones or horns, while threads were made of animal sinew. Iron needles were invented in the 14^th century, and the 15^th century brought the first eyed needles.

Thoughts for Mother’s Day

“I’d like to be the ideal mother, but I’m too busy raising my kids.”– Unknown

The mother of three notoriously unruly youngsters was asked whether or not she’d have children if she had it to do over again. “Yes,” she replied. “But not the same ones.”– David Finkelstein

A teacher gave her class of second graders a lesson on the magnet and what it does. The next day in a written test, she included this question: “My full name has six letters. The first one is M. I pick up things. What am I?” When the test papers were turned in, the teacher was astonished to find that almost 50 percent of the students answered the question with the word Mother– Unknown

Five Minute Fun – Silk Flower Pencil Topper

Drawing is more fun with a super fancy pencil! Choose a silk flower that has a stem, and then attach it to a pencil or pen by wrapping tape (masking, scotch, even floral tape) around both pencil and stem. Tip: don’t wrap all the way down the pencil, as you will want to sharpen it eventually!

We’re Growing….

Our Kids Craft Club is growing quickly! Check our website to see what members have to say, or take a look at our new press page .

Craft Ideas: Nine Crafty things to take and do while camping

June 19, 2016 admin

We try to squeeze in some camping over the summer months to get our fill of water time, marshmallow roasts, hiking and biking. But there are also times when we just feel like hanging around the campsite enjoying the beautiful shade of the forest from our lawn chairs. Quiet time at the campsite is a great time to pull out some activities for the kids, and we’ve got a few crafty ideas to recommend:

Drawing Supplies – a sketch pad and pencil can lead to treasure maps drawn, stories written, leaf rubbings made, games played (such as tic-tac-toe) or, perhaps most obviously, inspired drawings
Paints and brushes – gathered sticks and rocks can become art forms as they get a coating of bright paint from the kids. Transform rocks into bugs or animals, and sticks can become wands.
Wikki Stix – an easy portable activity, these wax covered strings can bend into any shape and can be used by themselves on a playboard, and could even be wrapped around a found rock or twig to give it a shock of colour
Collage Boards – our kids spent over an hour searching for just the right foliage to adorn their butterfly boards. Also try sprinkling sections of sand on these for a beach activity
Masking Tape or painters tape – mask out a giant x & O board in the dirt, and find some sticks to mark X & O. Then ‘erase’ your game and start over again. Or, make a nature walk bracelet by putting a piece of masking tape sticky-side-out around your wrist. Collect little treasures such as leaves and twigs to add to your nature braclet
Sunpaper – this is one of our favourites for summer, whether at home or out camping. Find a pretty leaf or flower, add a ray of sun and a sprinkling of water, and watch these prints come to life.
Fort building supplies – Clothes pins and string aren’t only for hanging laundry to dry! A good nook of trees can be transformed into an uuber cool fort with the help of some towels or blanket secured with clothes pins on a line.
Building supplies – we have a bin of building blocks that comes on every single camping trip and gets used on a blanket outside, or under cover if we’re hit with rain
Leaf Press – collect samples of your favourite trees or flowers (if permitted by the park) and store them between the folds of this leaf press. Patient campers will have pretty mementos to add to scrap books or to use with other craft projects.

Strawberry Season Activities for Kids

June 15, 2016June 15, 2016 admin

I love strawberries, and this is the time of year that they can be found in abundance! Most grocery stores carry strawberries all year these days, but there’s nothing like fresh picked strawberries from a strawberry farm or patch. Picking strawberries and deciding what to do with them is a great activity for the kids too. Here are some strawberry-themed activities and ideas to explore with the kids:

1. Go strawberry picking – strawberry season is now, so check out your many local strawberry farms. The ones in our area provide buckets or allow your own, so let your child grab their favourite bucket, pail or basket before you go. For older kids, the bucket weighing can be a great math opportunity too – it gets weighed before picking, and after, so kids can figure out how much weight they picked. Depending on the quantity of strawberries you’re aiming for, and you’re child’s age & interest, this activity can take anywhere from 15 minutes to an hour or more.

Picking Strawberries with Kids

2. Mush up some strawberries – put some cleaned, hulled strawberries into the bottom of a pot or deep mixing bowl, and let the kids mush them up with a potato masher. You might need to help them get started by doing the first couple of mashes, or you can cut the strawberries in half before they get started. It’s also a lot of fun to put the potato masher aside and let the kids at it with their hands. The gooey mushy feeling of the strawberries is a fun tactile experience for toddlers and preschoolers in particular. Make sure to use clean hands for this project so that the strawberry mush can be used as a topping, turned into jam, or included in a smoothy.

3. Make strawberry watercolours – cut a couple of berries in half and place into a pot with a cup of water. Bring the water to a boil, boiling for 1 minute (note: an adult should do this part!). Let cool. Remove the berries and use the pink water to make water colour paintings in pink themes. Think cotton candy, flowers, or sunsets. You could also use the liquid as a natural dye for playdough, similar to the dying process used in this natural play dough

Natural watercolors for kids

4. Strawberry stamping – cut some berries in half and use them as stamps on paper or fabric. This is a good activity to do outside on a sunny day

Strawberry stamp art for kids

5. Hulling strawberries – I’ll admit that this seems like a mundane task to most adults, but work can be fun, especially for kids, so invite them to help as you hull your berries. We usually hull them and I slice them into a freezer bag to enjoy throughout the winter

Do you have any strawberry season activity ideas? Let us know!