Marble Painting

This is a real hit with kids of all ages (and adults alike!) and creates a magnificent effect.

Age Group: 2 years upwards
Estimated Time: Under 30 minutes
Messiness: Medium

Materials:

• Printer paper lid
• A4 white cardboard
• Poster paint (not too thick)
• Marbles

Method:

1. Place the cardboard paper into the printer paper lid.
2. Pour different coloured runny poster paint onto the card in blobs in different places.
3. Place a marble or two in each blob of paint and then sway the lid from side to side so that the marbles move around the card.
4. Be careful when you remove the card from the lid as it will be quite soggy - place to dry.
5. Repeat!!

Sandpaper Tree

This craft is a very nice sensory craft and the finish product looks really good!

Age Group: 2 years (with help) to 8 years
Estimated Time: Under 30 minutes
Messiness: Low

Materials:

• White A4 cardboard paper
• Black sandpaper
• Wax crayons
• White craft glue
• Scissors
• Different shaped leaves

Method:

1. Collect different shaped leaves and trace the outline onto sandpaper with a wax crayon.
2. Cut the leaves out and colour them in with different coloured crayons
3. Cut out a rectangle from the sandpaper for the tree trunk and colour it in with a brown crayon.
4. Paste them onto the white card with craft glue.

Nutella Cookies

These are the most delicious and addictive biscuits I have ever tasted! They can be on the more expensive side due to the cost of Nutella though...

Ingredients:

• 2 eggs
• 1 cup of Nutella (1 and a bit jars of Nutella)
• 1 cup of flour
• Mixing bowl
• Wooden spoon
• Baking paper/flour

Method:

1. Preheat your oven to 180 degrees Celsius
2. Measure out a cup of Nutella into the mixing bowl.
3. Add 1 cup of flour and mix.
4. Add 2 eggs and mix well.
5. Once it has all been mixed together well, spoon out onto baking paper or a well floured baking tray.
6. Bake in the oven for 10 minutes. They may need to go in for a minute or two extra depending on their size. (Poke a toothpick into the middle of a cookie, and if it comes out clean, they are ready. If the toothpick comes out with batter on it, bake for another minute or so.)
7. They are really good warm but still scrumptious cold - if they aren't all eaten before then!!!

Clothes Peg Magnets

Age Group: 2 years (with help) to 10 years
Estimated Time: Under 15 minutes excluding drying time
Messiness: Medium

Materials:

• Pegs (either wooden or plastic)
• Paint (acrylic for plastic pegs, poster for wooden pegs)
• Glitter glue
• Bostik glue
• Magnet strips

Method:

1. Paint the pegs with either acrylic or poster paint, depending on the type of peg being used.
2. Let it dry.
3. Use Bostik glue to stick a magnet strip onto the under side of the peg.
4. Decorate the top of the peg as desired.
5. Let it dry completely before using.

Tissue Paper Chick

Brilliant Easter craft!

Age Group: 2 years (with help) to 5 years
Estimated Time: Around 30 minutes
Messiness: Low

Materials:

• Yellow cardboard paper
• White craft glue
• 2 googly eyes
• Orange tissue paper
• 2 orange pipe cleaners
• 2 feathers
• Cellotape

Method:

1. Cut out a small circle from the yellow card.
2. Roll up pieces of tissue paper in small balls.
3. Spread a layer of white craft glue onto the circle and paste down the tissue paper balls.
4. Use craft glue to stick on a triangular beak and googly eyes.
5. Once it has dried, turn it over and cellotape the feathers and legs to the circle.

Picture Frame

Brilliant for older kids with good concentration.

Age Group: 6 years to 10 years
Estimated Time: 15 - 30 minutes
Messiness: Medium

Materials:

• Coloured cardboard paper
• Coloured ice-cream sticks
• White craft glue
• Scissors
• Buttons
• Glitter glue

Method:

1. We started first by designing the frame on the A4 piece of card and came up with this design for a frame.
2. We used white craft glue to stick it down onto the card.
3. I then drew a very simple picture with glitter glue. Kgosi (age 8) decided to use one of his own photo's from his birthday to frame.
4. We then cut the cardboard to size once everything had dried.

Washline Clothing Theme

I used this activity when I was doing my Seasons theme.

Materials:

• 2 A4 pieces of white cardboard paper
• 2 pieces of string
• Wooden pegs (I used 13)
• Cellotape
• Felt in a variety of colours
• Scissors

Method:

1. Cut out a variety of winter and summer clothing from the different coloured felt. For winter, I cut out trousers, mittens, long sleeve shirt, sock, hoodie, boot, wooly hat and a scarf. For summer, I cut out a swimming costume, a t-shirt, shorts, a cap and a slip slop.
2. Cut to pieces of string long enough to go from one side of the paper to the other with a slight dip.
3. Cellotape the pegs into place.
4. Peg the clothing onto the correct pages (Winter and Summer).
5. A more interactive way of doing this, is to put all the cut-outs into a pile and get your children to sort out which are summer items and which are winter items and peg them up themselves.