Fall Fun Series: 3 Easy Arts and Crafts!

Today we begin our Fall Fun Series! All week we will be posting about things related to and celebrating the changing season; arts & crafts, recipes, home decor, etc! To kick it off, we thought we’d share a few easy-peasy crafts you can do with your children 🙂 We are excited to embrace the new season as cooler temperatures have seemed to finally arrive (at least in the morning & evening)!

PUMPKIN SEED PUMPKIN CRAFT

What you’ll need:

• Lightweight cardboard (we cut up an empty cereal box)
• Pumpkin printable template
• Painters or masking tape
• Paint brush
• Black marker
• White glue
• Orange, green and brown paint
• Newspaper (to cover the painting surface)
• 100 dried pumpkin seeds (a small bag will be more than enough). If you are using seeds that aren’t store bought, make sure to roast them first to dry them out, otherwise the paint will never stick!

How to make your Pumpkin Seed Pumpkin Craft:

1. Cover your craft area with newspaper. Make giant tape donuts and stick them down to the newspaper. Lay the pupmkin seeds out in a row on the tape. This is the easiest way to have your child paint the seeds – otherwise it’s quite a bit messy! You need about 100 seeds total (this is enough to give you a bit extra).
2. Paint the seeds. You need 2 seeds painted green (for the leaf), 4 seeds painted brown (for the stem) and the rest painted orange.
3. While the paint dries, print out the pumpkin template. Cut the pumpkin out and trace it onto a lightweight sheet of cardboard.
4. Squeeze white glue onto the pumpkin drawing and spread it around with your finger to make an even layer.
5. Place the seeds, painted side up, onto glue to create your pumpkin!

This is the actual link to this activity (want to make sure I give them all the credit!) http://www.allkidsnetwork.com/crafts/fall/pumpkin-seed-pumpkin.asp

BEAN LEAF CRAFT

What you’ll need:

• Poster board or lightweight cardboard (like a cereal box)
• White glue (a glue stick won’t work well here)
• Scissors
• Leaf template 1Leaf template 2
• Dry beans (we used a 15 bean soup mix)

How to make your Bean Leaf Craft:

1. Print our leaf template and cut it out. Trace it onto poster board and cut the leaf out.
2. Apply a generous amount of glue to the leaf cut out and spread it evenly over the surface.
3. Add beads to the glue.

Actual activity & to whom all credit is due: http://www.allkidsnetwork.com/crafts/fall/bean-leaf-craft.asp

FINGERPRINT INDIAN CORN CRAFT

What you’ll need:

• Yellow and green construction paper
• Printable corn template
• Scissors
• White glue
• Red, orange, yellow, and white washable paint.

How to make your Fingerprint Indian Corn Craft:

1. Print our corn template and cut the pieces out. Trace the corn piece onto yellow construction paper, and the husk piece onto green construction paper. Cut both pieces out.
2. Glue the corn piece onto the husk piece.
3. Have your children dip their fingers into the paint and dot the different colors onto the corn. This works best if you can convince them to use one color at a time, but looks just as cute if they all get smeared together too!

Actual activity & to whom all credit is due: http://www.allkidsnetwork.com/crafts/fall/bean-leaf-craft.asp

Remember, if you do any of these crafts, post on Instagram and hashtag #westvalleymoms! We’d love to see what you do with your little ones 🙂 Happy crafting!!!