Kiwi Crate Blog

5 Easy DIY Wrapping Paper Ideas

by ryan in Holiday on December 3, 2012

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This year, our family was inspired to make our own wrapping paper for all our Christmas presents. It seemed silly to buy some when we already had yards and yards of kraft paper in our art supply closet just waiting to be turned into festive gift wrap. I love the natural handmade look, and my kids are so proud to give presents they wrapped themselves!

LITTLE HANDPRINTS

There’s nothing cuter than little hands and feet! And my kids love to make handprints. Just brush on washable paint with a foam brush and help your child press their hand on the paper. We’ll be using this personalized gift wrap for all the gifts to the grandparents.

Handprint Wrapping Paper

PINE NEEDLE STARS

Use a little bit of your holiday greenery to create a fun star pattern. Dip the pine needles in a little cup of paint, then press on the paper to form a star. Try different pieces to vary the pattern.

Create DIY Star-printed Wrapping Paper with Pine Needles

COOKIE CUTTER PRINTS

Dip holiday cookie cutters in paint to create a pretty design. Pour some paint onto a paper plate and dip the cookie cutter in the paint. For a thicker line, use the rounded side of the cookie cutter.

DIY Holiday Wrapping Paper with Cookie Cutters

ROLLING PIN STAMPS

Foam stickers on a rolling pin create a beautiful snowy pattern! Stick self-adhesive foam stickers onto a rolling pin, then brush paint onto the stickers with a foam brush. Slowly roll the rolling pin along the paper to make a pattern.

Create this mod wrapping paper pattern with a rolling pin

FOAM STICKER STAMPS

Kids can make their own stamp by placing a foam sticker onto a wooden block. Use any shape you like, or cut your own! Use a foam brush to apply the paint to the sticker, then stamp on the paper.

DIY Wrapping Paper with Wood Block Stamps

You can even use the same technique to decorate ribbons.

DIY Stamped Holiday Ribbon

I hope you enjoy creating your own unique gift wrap. Tell us your favorite technique in the comments!

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Kiwi Crate delivers monthly projects for kids ages 3 to 7, all materials and inspiration included. All activities are reviewed by experts and tested by kids to make sure they encourage curiosity, exploration, and creativity! Learn more.

Handprint Monsters

by patty in Arts & Crafts, Holiday on September 21, 2012

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The days are getting shorter and the nights cooler, which means Halloween is slowly creeping up on us! My two boys already have their costumes ready for a spooktacular trip to the Happiest Place on Earth for Mickey’s Halloween Party. (If you’re looking for a DIY costume, check out the Halloween crates in our Celebration Shop).

Grab your little one and get into the ghoulish spirit by making these fun handprint monsters. The kids had a giggly good time decorating their monsters during a recent kid testing session, especially because they went overboard with the googly eyes!

Tools & Materials

cardstock paper
3 different colors of paint (or more if you wish)
foam brush
googly eyes
glue
black and colored Sharpies (grownup supervision required!)
white and red paint for decoration

After making sure everyone had on a smock (this activity can get a bit messy!), I used a foam brush to paint the kids’ hands. (Even though a plain ‘ol handprint is fine, it’s also fun to ask the kids how they might make different monster shapes. For example, they could put paint only on two fingers or on different parts of their hands…) There were plenty of giggles as the paint was applied…

Then, PLOP!, the kids used their hand as a stamp and pressed down firmly on sheets of paper.

After letting the paint dry, decorate your creature with googly eyes, markers, or extra paint.

Hang your masterpiece for all to see. These little monsters are a sweet reminder that little hands grow so fast…

To make these prints stand out as Halloween decor even more, you can use black paper with orange or white paint only. For another fun twist, try using neon paint to really make the colors pop. Happy crafting!

Pumpkin Decorating with Pins and Yarn

by sandra in Arts & Crafts, Holiday, Science on September 20, 2012

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Halloween is so highly anticipated in our household. The costumes, the crisp fall air, and…the pumpkin decorating!

In past years, we’ve had fun with paint, similar to what Jami experienced in a post last year. This year, I wanted to try something a little different. I was inspired by a combination of materials and activities I’ve seen in preschool classrooms. We pulled together pushpins, yarn, scissors and, of course, pumpkins.

“Sharp pushpins for kids?!” you might ask incredulously. I asked the same thing when my daughter, who was 3 at the time, would come home from preschool with outlines dotted with pinholes. The teachers assured me that the kids did really well with them and developed their fine motor skills. I was sold (though I did watch carefully over the kiddos to make sure things were going safely and all pins were accounted for).

As for the combination of pins and yarn, I thought we could recreate geoboards on our pumpkins. Have you seen these? The combination of nails in boards along with rubber bands is geometric magic. Perhaps the kiddos could wrap yarn around their pushpins to create new patterns and shapes? So, we set up all of the materials and off we went. My three-year-old began making a line of “eyes,” which evolved into a “100 eye” pumpkin. Good thing we had a lot of pushpins!

Then, some yarn was weaved amongst the pushpins. I helped start and stop the yarn by simply wrapping it around the pin and pushing the pushpin all the way. (Frankly, he would have been completely happy with pushpins alone.)

My five-year-old created a little girl pumpkin with a flower in her hair.

On the back of her pumpkin, she made a heart and then weaved the yarn between the pushpins.

They were thrilled with their creations, and they’re asking for more pumpkins to decorate!

Meanwhile, I had to try the technique myself. Here’s my attempt at a spider web. Ooh – hexagon in the middle!

How do you plan on decorating your pumpkins this year?

For more DIY Halloween fun, take a look at our Halloween Costume Crates in our Celebration Shop!

Back-to-School Creativity Tip #9: Create a Classroom or Naptime Keepsake!

by danielle in Arts & Crafts, Back-To-School Creativity Tips on September 3, 2012

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Being away from home can be tough on kids. Our school recommends making a special keepsake that kids can keep in their cubbies and pull out at nap time or when they’re feeling sad. Every year since preschool, my son Dillon and I make something new together to bring to school for this very purpose. This year, he asked if we could make a “stuffy” that he could cuddle with during quiet time.

We ended up making two different stuffies. For the first stuffy, Dillon drew what he wanted the stuffy to look like (our kitty), and then traced the shape around cotton canvas. I helped him cut out the fabric and then he used fabric paint and markers to color kitty. With an embroidery needle and thread, he stitched up most of the kitty and stuffed her with batting. I then helped him sew up the final edge. (Note: Dillon is 6, and has had sewing practice in preschool. There were a few pokes to the finger, but no blood and he didn’t seem to mind.)

Here is the drawing and the finished stuffy:

make your own stuffed animal

For the second stuffy, Dillon asked if I could sew it with my sewing machine because he wanted a sturdy, pillow-like stuffy. Since I wanted Dillon to have a hand in creating both stuffies, I asked him to draw the design. We discussed some of the types of things that mommy can sew (simpler shapes, and a little rounded—nothing too fancy; I’m a basic sewer and this was the first time I’ve pulled out my sewing machine in over a year).

Here’s the design Dillon came up with:

make a lovey from a child's drawing

And here’s the pattern we created from his drawing:

make a lovey from a child's drawing

I added 1/4″ around for the seam and traced the pattern onto the fabric with a fabric pencil.

We went through some fabric scraps I had around and decided on soft grey cotton flannel for the body, bright orange and green felt for the eyes, and some bright purple orange and green thread.

create a stuffed animal from a child's drawing

To create this stuffy, I first pinned the pattern face-down to two pieces of fabric facing right side in. Dillon traced the shape onto the fabric with a fabric pencil, and I cut the fabric out. Dillon cut the circles of felt, and together we hand-sewed these on. We used the bright green thread to create an eye. Once these details were on, I pinned the two sides together right side in and stitched them on my machine, leaving an opening for stuffing. (Note: I left a slightly larger opening, so that it would be easier for Dillon to help.)

create a stuffed animal from a child's drawing

Once the stuffy was sewn, Dillon turned it right side out and began stuffing. For the inside, we used a mix of recycled stuffing (old t-shirts we cut into strips) and extra cotton batting I had on hand. Dillon and I took turns. We had a few silly laughs while he put the “guts”" in. After our stuffy felt nice and pillowy, I stitched up the back end. (My placement of the opening created boyish giggling as well.)

create a stuffed animal from a child's drawing

Here is Dillon loving his two new stuffies, Kitty Buns and Round Circle. Dillon decided that Round Circle will go to school and Kitty Buns will stay home for nighttime cuddling.

create a stuffed animal from a child's drawing

Here are some other ideas for keepsakes: a small book of family photos, a family collage, a special blanket from home, or a blanket with your child’s name embroidered on it.

Are you creating a keepsake for your kid’s classroom? If so, what are you making?

Paper Crowns

by ryan in Arts & Crafts on May 24, 2012

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Paper Crown

I love paper crowns for celebrations – so fun, so easy, and so festive! We created this one with some leftover scrapbooking materials, but the beauty of this project is that you can make it as simple (or as fancy!) as you like. And if you’re not a scrapbooker and don’t feel like making an extra trip to the craft store, I bet you can pull this together with stuff you have around the house.

Paper Crown Supplies

What you’ll need:
Cardstock or other heavy-weight paper (construction paper works too)
Scissors
Tape
Stickers (or other festive embellishments) (Is your kid also a sticker-hoarder? do you have a bag / box / pile of random stickers stashed away someplace like I do? Now’s a great time to pull them out and use them up!)

Paper Crown Cutting

Since we used fancy paper for this crown, I decided on a simple zig-zag pattern that would be easy for my son to cut. He was delighted with the wavy scissors, and very carefully cut (mostly) along the lines. (Of course, fancy scissors are a bonus; regular scissors work just fine!)

Paper Crown Taping

We cut zig-zags out of both sides of the paper, then taped them together to form a strip long enough for a crown.

Paper Crown Stickers

Then, time to decorate! We’re very excited about numbers in our house right now, so I provided a set of number stickers and he went to town.

Paper Crown

And there you go, a festive crown perfect for a birthday, or to celebrate a lost tooth, for your knight- or princess-in training, or just because!

Rainbow Flowers for Mother’s Day

by ryan in Arts & Crafts on May 9, 2012

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Rainbow Flowers

I hope I’m not the only one out there who winds up responsible for planning her own mother’s day gifts every year! I was pondering ideas for a project that would be both mom- and kid-friendly when I saw white carnations at the grocery store. They reminded me of how much I used to love dyeing flowers with food coloring when I was kid – there’s just something so magical about watching the color travel up through the stem all the way to the tips of the petals. Just for fun, I thought I’d add a little color-mixing exploration and create a rainbow!

Rainbow Flowers

All you need for this project is flowers and food coloring. Carnations are a good choice because they’re inexpensive, long-lasting, and they suck up the color quickly. To prep the flowers, I cut off the stems ends so they’d drink the water faster, then placed them in cups of water. I just happened to have the right number of flowers to do all the colors of the rainbow and have one left over to leave white, so we could compare the difference.

Rainbow Flowers

I used paste food coloring because it was what I had on hand, but the liquid kind works just as well. The only trick with the food coloring is that it helps to use a lot! I mean, really a lot – the water should be dyed a nice, deep color.

Rainbow Flowers

The mixing step turned out to be a lot of fun by itself. My son very seriously and carefully mixed each color until we had this lovely water rainbow in our window.

Rainbow Flowers

And then we came back just hours later to find that our flowers were already starting to turn colors! We kept checking on our flowers throughout the day and watched the color deepen and spread. Some flowers turned out more vibrant than others, and it was really interesting to watch the patterns the colors make as they travel through the flower petals.

Rainbow Flowers

We left them overnight, and in the morning we had a lovely pastel rainbow.

Rainbow Flowers

Add a little bit of ribbon and sweet little boy, and voila! Happy mother’s day!

Rainbow Flowers for Mama

Two Ingredient Tuesday: Jar + Yarn = Vase

by ryan in Arts & Crafts, Two Ingredient Tuesdays on May 8, 2012

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DIY flower vases

Mother’s Day is coming up, and in our house, that means flowers! Since I had a big stash of empty jelly jars just waiting for a craft, I thought of these cute DIY vases — all you need are some jars and some yarn. Just wrap the yarn around, cross it to hold in place, and keep wrapping. When you get to the end of the yarn, just tuck the loose end under to hold it in place.

DIY flower vases

If you’re starting with clean jars, there’s no prep work at all. If you’re recycling and need to remove the label, learn from my mistake and get that done before you have three kids demanding to know when they could start making vases. (The smarter way to do it would be to soak the label with vegetable oil, let it sit for an hour or so, then scrub it off.)

DIY flower vases

Older kids might want to experiment with layering different colors of yarn, or try wrapping it in neat rows. But I think even the overlapping wrapping looks really fun, and it’s easy enough that even little kids can participate.

DIY flower vases

We had such a good time creating this set, we decided to create a second set to give as gifts!

See more great ideas for Mother’s Day in our roundup here!

What are your favorite kids’ crafts for Mother’s Day? Tell us in the comments!

Teacher Appreciation Round-up

by ryan in Arts & Crafts on May 2, 2012

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Did you know teacher appreciation week is next week (the first full week of May)? Also, incredibly enough, it’s not too early to start thinking about how to thank your teachers as the school year draws to a close. For either occasion, we wanted to share some fun gifts kids can make to say thank you!

(via Aunt Peaches)

We thought this Children’s Art Vase from Aunt Peaches was just adorable, and I bet our kids’ teachers would too. It’s multi-functional, too; most classrooms can always use more organizing cups for pencils (or crayons, or scissors, or glue dots…). For kids learning to write, this would be especially sweet with a hand-written “thank you” for the teacher! This would also be a nice way to present a group gift card from the class, tucked into the flowers. (The kids could even fill with Tissue Paper Flowers.)

(via Givers Log)

For a gift from the whole class, it’s nice to have all the children contribute their own personal touch. Painted garden stoneswith children’s names are a great way to dress up the gift of a beautiful plant.

(via Skip To My Lou)

For gift cards, fancy it up with a pretty cardboard holder. The instructions call for using Mod Podge on cardboard, but if you have some pretty cardstock on hand you can simplify. Just cut the envelope shape out of cardstock and fold – embellishment optional!

(via Maureen Cracknell)

Any teacher will tell you that the best gift is a sincere “thank you” from a student. This rose stamp (made from the root end of celery!) is simple enough for a preschooler to manage, but so pretty you’ll want to make a whole stack of cards. It’s a sweet gift with just a note, or could also be a nice way to present a gift card.

(via Toddler Approved)

These egg carton flowers make surprisingly pretty cards. You can stop with the stamping step if you want a card that fits in an envelope, or glue on your egg carton flowers for a dimensional effect.

How are your children thanking their teachers? Share your ideas in the comments!

Marbled Model Magic Flowers

by ryan in Arts & Crafts on April 23, 2012

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Model Magic Bouquet

We created these marbled flowers as a fun gift to mail to Grandma and Gramps. They were so easy to make and the result is so pretty, I think this might become our go-to handmade birthday gift project. I picked Model Magic as the material because it’s so lightweight – they’ll be easy to mail, and could even be mounted in a shadowbox frame for display.

You’ll need:
Model Magic in several colors (we used our leftovers from our Garden Kiwi Crate!)
Wax paper for drying (optional, but helpful for large flowers)

Roll out stems

We started by rolling out the stems, just like you’d roll out a snake. My original thought was to make several flowers and then tie them together with a pretty ribbon. But as soon as I said “bouquet”, my son decided that the stems had to be joined together, so that’s what we did.

Join the stems to make a bouquet

Then we moved on to mixing colors. The marbling technique is really easy and fun; just squash two colors together and press and fold. (My 3-year-old never got past this step, he was having so much fun squashing the colors together.)

Mix the colors

Then we added the flower petals…

Press the petals

And finally, a piece of dirt for the flower to grow. To dry, I just set it on the bag the Model Magic came in.

Model Magic sunflower

We also created a giant sunflower – this was so big and delicate, we worked directly on the wax paper so we wouldn’t have to move it.

Marbled bowl

And finally, a joint project with my 3-year-old. After his exploration of the marbling technique, we were left with a big piece of streaky Model Magic, which became this bowl, perfect for little treasures (but not food, Model Magic is not food-safe).

This project was a lot of fun, and I think Grandma and Gramps will love their flower bouquet!

Egg Carton Challenge: Transport Ship

by ryan in Arts & Crafts on April 12, 2012

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Space Ship Egg Carton

Our friend Rachelle at Tinkerlab is running her latest Creative Challenge: Egg Carton, so of course we were so excited to participate! The rules are simple: all projects should be child-directed (although grown-ups are welcome to join in as well) and must use an empty egg carton. The objective of these challenges is to help children learn to trust their own ideas, build creative confidence, and envision new purposes for common objects. You can check out all the fantastic project ideas at the Creative Challenge post, and if you have an egg carton project to share, you can join the fun, too! See details at the bottom of this post.

This was a timely challenge for me, as I’d collected a pile of egg cartons left over from Easter. Plus egg cartons are one of my favorite recycled building materials – easy to cut, easy to decorate, and the perfect size for keeping little treasures. My son immediately jumped on the idea of making a spaceship, which evolved into this rocket-powered car transport ship.

Egg Carton Ingredients

You’ll need:
empty egg carton
duct tape
markers and other decorative embellishments (optional)
scissors

Egg Carton - cutting the hatches
Step 1: Cut the hatchways
This is the only step I helped with. I cut two hatchways, positioned so there was enough material left on the ends for our spaceship’s rockets. I created really big hatches because I knew I needed to leave room for cars get on board.

Egg Carton - tape it closed
Step 2: Tape the carton shut
Take the duct tape and seal the carton, so the only openings are the hatchways. We taped all the way around the edge, and then added more on top of the hatchways so they’d match.

Egg Carton - decorating your spaceship
Step 3: Decorate and fly!
We just used different colors of tape and markers to decorate our spaceship, but at this point you could glue on any embellishments you like. We used red duct tape for the rockets, outlined with the marker. (We used a permanent marker since washable markers don’t work well on duct tape, but you could certainly use washable markers to decorate the carton). At that point, my son declared his spaceship “awesome”, loaded it up with cars and zoomed away!

If you want to submit your own egg carton project for this challenge, or just get inspiration from all amazingly creative submissions, go check out Tinkerlab’s Egg Carton Creative Challenge post. To participate, you can submit to the Linky at the end of the post. Or if you don’t have a blog, just add a photo in a comment. Plus, all comments submitted before Sunday, April 15, 2012 will be entered to win a free crate from Kiwi Crate. Happy creating!