With half term and school holidays looming, we’d like to offer you a number of craft ideas for keeping the children occupied and for encouraging their creativity.
Tapestry Weaving
You will need a tapestry frame or an old picture frame, a selection of yarns (these can include strips of fabric, plastic bags or ribbons, our Mixed Bag of Yarns may be of interest), and a small piece of cardboard to wrap the yarn around to use as a shuttle. Heres how to get started with tapestry weaving.
Polymer Clay Bead Necklace
You will need 2/3 packs of different coloured polymer clay (FIMO Soft may be better for children as it requires little conditioning), a length of leather thong or a shoe lace, a cocktail stick or similar for making the holes, and a baking sheet which should not be used for cooking once it has been in contact with the clay. Find out how this simple, yet beautiful stone effect necklace was made.
Felt Balls
You will need a small bag of Merino Wool Fibres (we have a 100g bag of mixed colours, or you can choose from 50g bags from many lovely colours!), a spray bottle with diluted washing up liquid and elbow grease!
Try your hand at making a felted ball caterpillar! Following the same technique, you can use the balls to make felt beads for colourful jewellery or keyrings.
Heliographic Sun Printing
You will need 1-3 colours of Jacquard Dye-na-flow fabric paint, a mask which will lay close to the fabric such as a cardboard cut-out, keys or leaves, and an old t-shirt or length of cotton fabric. Here are further ideas on how to print using the sun or a source of ultraviolet light.
We hope you have fun with our recommendations and look forward to seeing what you have made!
These crafts will generally need an adults supervision and sensible precautions should be taken when handling materials and equipment.