5 Fun and Easy Crafts for Kids to Make at Home

One of our favorite activities to do with our kids is making crafts! Kids’ crafts is a fun way to spend a day – perfect for a rainy afternoon, a cozy weekend inside, or at any time really! Best of all, there are so many different types of crafts that you can easily find something that fits your interests, skill level, or even materials that you happen to have at home!

If you don’t think of yourself as a crafty person, don’t worry. This is more about having fun together than about the quality of what you create. Don’t overthink it, just have fun! Your kids will enjoy putting together their own crafts and putting them on display in their bedroom or other places around your house.  

We’ve discussed paper crafts before, and today we wanted to give you 5 additional fun (and easy!) craft ideas for kids that are perfect for you to do at home with your kids. If you’ve run out of ideas on what to make with your kids, hopefully these 5 crafts will get you thinking! Some are more paper crafts, while some involve other items that you can find around your house.

Benefits of Easy Crafts for Kids

Did you know that crafting is more than just a fun activity? There’s actually lots of benefits to it! One major benefit is that it will help your child to increase their creativity, a skill that you want to start focusing on earlier in their life rather than later. Depending on the craft itself it can also help with things like dexterity and motor skills in younger children, and even following directions! 

As your kids get older you can also start to give them more responsibilities and tasks, helping them fine-tune certain skills like using scissors, using a ruler to make measurements, and more. Working on these skills in the context of a fun craft is a great way to encourage these skills without it feeling like a chore or like something boring. We always think it’s a great idea to take something that isn’t traditionally seen as fun and turn it into something enjoyable – it’s a great way to learn and grow and have some fun!   

Now that you are all excited to have some fun and get crafty, let’s get into our kids craft ideas.

Cool Crafts for Kids!

1. Recycled Can Windsocks

Do you have some old cans lying around waiting to be recycled? Go ahead and grab them for this fun and easy craft! We love that this craft is super easy, but also teaches a great lesson about recycling!

Finding a use for an item, such as a can, after you have used it for its original use is a great way to teach your kids the importance of recycling and upcycling items that can serve more than one purpose. 

These cans will get painted in whatever colors you and your kids choose. You then need to find your supplies for the streamers you will attach to the cans. Ribbons work great, but so do strips of paper, yarn, or even strips of fabric if you have it! 

What is great about these kids crafts is that they are very flexible. Your kids can paint their cans however they want, and they can attach whatever ribbon or paper to the bottom. This is a great opportunity for them to express themselves and do what comes to their mind. If you have multiple children, have them each create their own and see how different each one is!

Go as creative as you want with these windsocks, and then be sure to hang them up either inside or even outside in your backyard or on a deck or balcony if you have one. Regular acrylic paint is a great option, but you can also go with something more fun like glow in the dark paint.

2. Paper Animal Masks 

This next craft is a bit more technical, but it’s nothing that you can’t handle! Paper animal masks are a super fun craft to do with your kids. Plus, once you create the masks, you get to have more fun using the masks! 

If you are worried you don’t know how to make a mask that will actually resemble an animal, you’ll be happy to know that you can download easy templates that you can simply print out and use as your guide! These paper crafts for kids will work better if you have cardboard to use as the base of the mask, along with a sturdy paper that you can fold to make other elements of the animals like their ears, eyes, and noses!

Your kids can start the fun off by deciding which animal they want to be. Maybe that will be based on their favorite stuffed animal, their favorite movie character, or their favorite animal they have learned about at school. Then, let them help you gather the supplies you need. We recommend that you cut the masks out of the cardboard, but your kids can definitely help with all the gluing! 

Once their masks are complete, let them put on a show acting as their animals! They can wear these around the house, and you can even keep them on hand if you need a quick Halloween costume for your kid!  

3. 3D Rainbows

What’s better than painting a rainbow? Creating a 3D rainbow, of course! This is a fun, easy craft for toddlers! Best of all, you’ll end up with a really cool 3D piece of art that you can display just about anywhere. 

All you’ll need is some white paper for the clouds, some rainbow sheets of paper for the rainbow, and some cotton balls to make the clouds 3D (in addition to things like glue, tape, and scissors for kids). If you don’t have multi-colored paper, don’t worry! You can always paint some strips of paper with some watercolor paints or other paints you have at home. Work with what you have!

These are pretty quick and easy art projects for kids, perfect for a fun little afternoon craft to enjoy without needing a lot of materials or having to worry about a lot of cleanup. 

Craft Originally From: Easy Peasy and Fun

4. Homemade Bird Feeder

If you have a backyard, a perfect 5-minute craft for kids to do with your kids that includes getting them outside is making a homemade bird feeder! Not only is it fun to create the feeder, but you’ll also have all the enjoyment of watching the birds come and eat once the feeder is complete!

What is really cool about the feeder is that it relies on using a stale bagel! This is a great way to make use of an old bagel instead of just throwing it away, and is another perfect lesson to teach your kids. Reducing waste can be fun, just like in this case. You can always use a regular bagel that isn’t stale yet if you want, but you can also use one that is stale that you forgot to eat. 

All you have to do is cover the bagel in some peanut butter and then place it in some birdseed to completely cover the bagel. Hang it up on a tree and watch the birds come to eat. This is a simple craft but a bit messier than some of the others, we recommend doing this outside. This is the perfect craft for kids to make on a day when the weather is nice and you want to spend some time outside. 

Once you’ve finished creating your bird feeder, stay outside for a while to watch the birds come and eat. Plan some other outdoor crafts for this time, or set up a sprinkler for kids and let your kids run around and burn off some energy. This makes for the perfect weekend activity! 

5. Tie-Dye Shirts

Finally, one of our favorite craft ideas for kids is to go a little retro and make tie-dye shirts! This is such a fun craft that kids have enjoyed for decades! Best of all, we think that parents should definitely get involved in this craft and make their own shirt as well. What’s more fun than ending up with matching shirts the whole family can wear?

What we really love about tie-dye shirts is that they all look different and unique. This is, of course, a result of not just the dye but also how you tie your rubber bands to your shirt.

We highly recommend that you do this craft outside, or if you have to do it inside, make sure you spread lots of newspaper or an old sheet or something to protect your counters, carpet, or furniture from dye. Make sure your kids wear clothing that they don’t care about getting stained as they might get dye on them as well!

As for the tie-dye itself, you can either DIY it if you want, or choose from plenty of tie-dye kits that have everything you’ll need. Gather some white t-shirts for the family, get your dye kit, and get to it! This is not just a fun craft for the family to enjoy but great to do if you have a family event coming up and you want to wear matching shirts. Why buy matching shirts when you could make them yourself? That’s way more fun! 

After making your shirts you can even branch out into crafting other items like jewelry and other accessories. With enough time at home crafting you might just have a new closet full of homemade items!  

Wrapping Up

You can get crafty at home with your kids in no time at all with these fun and easy crafts. While some require more preparation, they are all cool crafts that kids of all ages will enjoy. From masks to put on skits with, to fun new decor like rainbows and windsocks, to new clothing, and food for the birds, there’s a lot of fun to be had if you are willing to get just a little crafty!

What is your favorite type of craft? Do you like getting your hands dirty, or are you more of a paper folding craft kind of person? Let us know, and remember, whatever you do end up crafting with your kids, make sure you have fun! Check out our spring crafts for kids!