All You Need To Know To Make Crafts At Home With Your Children, Plus Free Funky Flower Pot Sticks Cr

Encouraging your child's creativity at home by creating craft items is very beneficial for their mental development. Children can explore different textures, shapes and patterns, and discover how to put ideas into action by handling different materials, and sticking and gluing them together. But remember - crafting can be great fun, and also a good way to spend some quality time with your children.

Buying craft supplies from a craft store can cost quite a lot of money, so why not start your own junk/scraps box at home. All you need is a box or a large storage bag that you keep in a cupboard ready to store your household packaging. It's easy to start collecting and is amazing how quickly your junk box or bag fills up with useful items. Each time you are in the kitchen preparing meals, keep all your empty boxes, tubs or cardboard tubes that you would normally throw in the bin or recyle, and add these to your craft box. Whenever you come across any interesting items, such as packaging and wrappers from birthday gifts or Christmas presents,you can put them in your box ready for when you want to make one of our crafts. Collect lots of items, from different shaped boxes, cardboard tubes, shiny paper, drinking straws, plastic bottle tops, and clean ice-lolly sticks. Even old outgrown tee shirts can be shredded into material strips.

Craft shops stock a comprehensive range of craft materials. Why not visit your local store and buy a small variety of items to store in your box. Look out for cheaper end of lines, two for the price of one, bargain buckets, and reduced price crafts that have damaged packaging. If you look out for these cheap deals, or just buy one or two inexpensive items per week, you will quickly build up a good stock of craft materials for your home craft projects. Look out for feathers, pom poms, wiggly eyes, wool, material, tissue paper, coloured paper and glitter. Even at Christmas you could collect lots of shiny things to use, including small pieces of tinsel, wrapping paper, ribbons, gift tags, parcel twine, and shiny foil sweet wrappers.

While out and about around the shops, check out material stores for fabric scraps, odd buttons, and for balls of cheap wool or yarn. Cookware shops often sell cheap wooden spoons and spatulas. You can make a whole family of spoon puppets just by sticking fabric and wool onto spoons and drawing on faces with felt-tipped pens.

Don't forget to always have lots of paint, coloured crayons, glue and sticky tape at home!

Here is a free craft to help you design your own Funky Flowerpot Sticks. These pretty sticks make an ideal gift for Mother's Day, and will brighten up any flowerpots around your home. These are so simple to make that you can create a few at a time very easily.

Funky Flowerpot Sticks

You will need:
Plain paper to draw on flower heads,
Felt-tip pens or wax crayons,
Large craft sticks/clean ice lolly sticks/green pea sticks
Glue stick or pva glue,
Sparkly glitter,
Sticky tape,
Scissors.

To Make - Design your own flower pictures on the plain paper with a pencil. Colour in your flowers with bright colours. Add some glitter with a glue stick or a little PVA glue to make the flower heads sparkle. Carefully cut out your flower head designs with scissors (adults can do this). Stick one flower head onto a lolly stick or pea stick with a piece of sticky tape.

Tip - This will brighten up any flowerpot on Mothers day.

This craft and a lot more are available, along with photographs, in full colour, in our free Messy Tots mini-craft book by instant download. See the author details below to get your free copy today.

M Newbold is a prolific writer on many subjects. For a free full colour mini-craft book, visit:
http://www.cotswoldfamilylife.co.uk
www.cotswoldfamilylife.co.uk