It's just a few days before Easter & you are starting to feel the pinstagram pressure. You've been scrolling social media seeing the curated baskets, bookshelves full of bunnies & spring, and the crafts. The brilliant, no way a child did that craft. You feel yourself start to spiral in shame and you begin to tell yourself that your kids holiday will be ruined without some diy fun.
pinstagram pressure mounting^
We're going to stop you right there. Shake out the shame spiral. Stop scrolling. You are doing great. Now that we have that established and you know your worth (shoutout to my dad for constantly reiterating that to us), and you still do want to add a little bit of something to your holiday-- we've got you. We have 3 very easy, minimal mess crafts to choose from. We even added one that your teen will enjoy.
Before we talk crafts, let's talk books. We have a whole blog post about our favorite bunny reads that have been a huge hit with our family during this Spring & Easter season. Write a few down that you'd like to read & head to your local library to have a few on hand this weekend. The book we've been reading nonstop this past week that is perfect *chef's kiss* for Easter and these crafts! It's:
pick a perfect egg by Patricia toht & Jarvis
This book, like the others in it's holiday series Pick a Pumpkin & Pick a Pine Tree, hops through a busy springtime day all the way to Easter Sunday. From the farm where you've carefully selected your eggs--eggs perfect for drawing on with crayon, for plopping into dyes and bejeweling--follow along as preparations continue for the much-awaited festivities. Then on Sunday, open your door and search for eggs of a different kind, filled with foil-wrapped chocolate, spinning tops, and jelly beans. The beautiful illustrations and wonderfully rhythmic text captures all the excitement of the holiday and is sure to become part of a new treasured tradition!
After reading Pick a Perfect Egg, we knew we needed to make the *perfect* egg craft. So we put together 3 crafts to do, one for each age range, in hopes that we can help even a little with the holiday stress.
craft 1: window art egg (Toddler)
If you are looking for a craft for your toddler or younger child, this one works on fine motor skills, hand strength, bilateral coordination and following verbal instruction.
Materials:
Thin cardboard: we like to use cereal boxes, granola bar boxes, etc
Scissors
Marker
Contact paper
Tissue paper
*Way to modify: if you do not have contact paper, you can just glue tissue paper to cardboard to make decorated egg
Instructions:
Draw egg shape on inside of cardboard. Give about 1/2in & outline the egg shape you made. You will be cutting out the egg and creating a border (see image below).
Place the cut out egg shaped border on sticky piece of contact paper.
Instruct child to rip tissue paper into small pieces and place small pieces INSIDE the egg shaped border. I'm not going to lie I had to repeat myself a few times to my 2yr old because he just enjoyed sticking the tissue paper to the sticky contact paper regardless if it was inside the border or not. But remember this activity is helping our toddlers work on listening to our verbal instruction. And it's just for fun!
After the egg is decorated to their liking, place a second piece of sticky contact paper down on top (sticky side to sticky side).
Cut along the outside of the egg shaped border.
Hang on window so sun can shine through & your child can be proud of their work.
Egg shaped outlines^^ Working on bilateral coordination by ripping tissue paper into pieces^^
finished product:
I love them! I think they are unique, easy to make & my kids really enjoyed the sensory input from the sticky contact paper. They sat quietly working on their designs for 20 mins straight & honestly I was shocked. So, naturally, I am planning all my future crafts around contact paper.
craft 2: invisible egg design surprise (School age)
This one I have down as a hidden message for my kids from the Easter bunny before & they were totally impressed. This year we decided to have our school aged child create his own masterful design. We worked on patterns and writing his name. The key to this craft though is pressing hard enough with the white crayon. As you can see with his, it is a little hard to see but I did trial on my own and if you press down hard enough it works really well.
Materials:
White watercolor paper/cardstock
Marker
White crayons
Watercolor paints
Water
Paintbrushes
*Way to modify: if child is too young, caregiver can draw with white crayon & child can paint to unveil the design
instructions:
Draw an egg-shape with marker.
Draw a design using a white crayon. Remember you will need to press hard when drawing for design to show up better (you can see above where our kid pressed hard and where he didn't)
After design is drawn, use watercolor paints to reveal your design.
The nice thing about this activity is that once kids start to watercolor paint, they won't want to stop watercolor painting and then you can enjoy your coffee/tea, cook an Easter feast or even paint alongside them!
craft 3: stained glass floral window art (teen)
We had teenagers in mind with this one, though we have done this with our school aged kids. For the latter, it just requires a little bit more set-up based on the kid's developmental level. Not going to lie, we enjoyed doing this one too. And I am thinking we may have to set this up as a family activity before or after we eat.
We teamed up with Tonya, the owner and designer of AlvaLumos! Tonya, a graphic designer, creates pre-designed invitations, stickers, and other paper goods. We love watching her creative process as she shares her designs on ig @alvalumos. She has created a pdf printable template for us to use to create our stained glass floral window art. Check out Tonya's Etsy shop here!
materials:
Laminator
Thermal Laminating Sheets
AlvaLumos printable template
Permanent markers: we like Sharpies
Scissors (not pictured)
*Way to modify: Younger kids will enjoy this craft too! You may need to pre-draw the template onto the laminating sheet or you may need to tape down the template and the laminating sheet so it does not slide while the child is tracing
Instructions:
Fire up your laminator. Send through an empty laminating pouch.
Download and print your AlvaLumos template.
Place your clear laminating sheet (it should look like a clear plastic paper) on top of your AlvaLumos template. Trace with BLACK permanent marker along the lines of the template. Again, if you have a younger child participating you may need to tape down both sheets or pre-trace the template.
Once you have the template traced, FLIP THE LAMINATING SHEET OVER. This is important. Now you can color in each section. If you do not flip over the laminating sheet, your colors may blend.
Once colored completely, cut out your egg shaped window art.
Hang on your sunniest window and watch the colors come to life!
There you have it! The *perfect* book & the *perfect* egg crafts! We hope that you now feel a little less stress and can be a little more present with your family this weekend. If you do any of these crafts, please show us! We would love to see; tag us on ig @mosskidsbooks & use #mosskidscraft
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