Friday, August 2, 2013

Arts & Crafts: Toddler Style

These days, Big Brother A will choose arts and crafts over most of his other toys. Painting, gluing, coloring, stamps, etc. he wants to try them all. He can actually spend a lot of time working on his crafts, which is nice. He still wants me to be near him and chit chat with him about what he is working on, but it gives us some nice quiet time together. His interest in crafts has really picked up in the last 4-5 months, before that the only craft related things he was interested in were stickers. Here are my top ten suggestions for everything you need to get started:

10. Crayons: I like crayons because they are not messy. Obviously this makes them a low priority for A who prefers anything that makes a mess. 

9. Pipe cleaners: This is more of a joint activity, but we have a lot of fun making different things with the pipe cleaners. I am thinking of cutting them up as another texture he can glue onto his pictures. 

8. Paints: I have introduced him to water colors a couple times, but he is not really into them yet. However I just purchased these dot paints, and if today is any indication, they will be getting a lot of use. 



7. Lots and lots of paper: We go through a lot of paper in this house. He loves construction paper, printer paper, notebook paper, any paper. I need to find a way to manage the paper consumption. I like when he is in his notebook phase, because at least then all the artwork is contained. 

6. Glue Stick: This is A's new obsession. He constantly asks me to cut him shapes that he can glue onto random papers. He still needs some help using the glue, but he loves it. 

5. Stamps: I originally tried to make my own stamps by cutting up sponges. He liked them, but he is way more interested in some other Melissa and Doug sets I have since purchased. Washable ink pads are expensive, but he is satisfied with this small starter set, and a larger animal set



4. Stickers: A can sit and do stickers for a long time. Foam stickers like this are his favorites, and he will usually neglect all his other stickers if there are foam ones around. The foam stickers can be pricey, but I try to get them on sale at Michael's with coupons. There is a bit of a learning curve for peeling the foam stickers, but A is pretty good at it now. 



3. Washable Markers: We get a lot of use out of these markers on a daily basis. I store his markers and colored pencils in a regular pencil box. 



2. Crafts display: A is ok with some of his things being thrown out if I do it when he isn't looking, but he does want to keep certain things. I came across this easy way to display kid crafts here using rope and clothes pins, and I thought it would be perfect for our long hallway. We only moved into our house last year, and most of our walls are still bare. I went to my good friend Mr. Google, who directed me to another blog with easy instructions about how to make my very own wire display. 

It's hard to get a good picture because the hallway is so narrow, but I just connected string between 2 nails, and I use clothespins to hang up the artwork


1. Toddler friendly work surface: This may be the most important aspect of kid crafting. I found this kids table on Craigslist, and I think having a kid-sized place to sit and work really helped foster his interest in crafts. 



*Disclosure of Material Connection: This post contains affiliate links

1 comment:

  1. I just saw the coolest product to reduce paper consumption- crayola dry erase crayons- draw on a laminated piece of paper, erase, and do some more!!

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