KIDS CRAFT: St David's Day Daffodils & Leeks

As a Volunteer at a local Mother and Toddler group I often get to devise the weekly craft for the kids to do. We try to work around theme based on calendar events and this week it's St Davids day. Here are two St David's day crafts you can do with your kids at home.

PINWHEEL DAFFODILS

What you will need:
An old egg box
Scissors
Some yellow paint
A paint brush
A 15x15 cm square of card/paper
A green straw
A split pin
A paper punch

Firstly cut one of the 'cups' out of the egg box, the shape of this will vary depending on the eggbox, but try to make it look even all the way around.

Next, get out the paint, and paint the cup and the paper and leave to dry. When we did this with the pre-schoolers, as we didn't have time for paint to dry, I pre-cut and painted the eggbox cups, and the children decorated the white sqaure with crayons/pen/tissue squares, this also worked well.

Once the paint has completely dried fold diagonally from corner to corner and then repeat on the other side. Cut along the 4 fold lines from corner toward the center (but stop about 2cm from the middle point). Fold into the center as shown above.

At this point I like to use a punch to make holes in each of the triangles where they crossover, in the cup itself and a little guide hole in the straw - this will make it easier to thread the split pin through. Pop the split pin through the cup, and then each pinwheel leaf in turn and the center of the pinwheel and finally through the straw. Before splitting the pin, loosen the pinwheel (too tight and it won't spin).

Here is the version we did with the kids this year, using crayon and tissue to decorate, and paper circle instead of an egg cup.

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PAPER LEEKS

For something a little different, this is a simple tutorial on making a paper leek - you could made a whole pile of them or perhaps invent more paper vegetables as part of a Harvest festival craft or healthy eating topic.

What you will need:

Green Paint

Paint brush

A4 white paper

Kitchen roll

Sticky tape

Paint the outside edges of the paper (leaving the middle white) and when dry repeat on the other side. To make a longer more realistic sized leek, turn the paper portrait and paint the top half green (repeat on other side).

While you wait for it to dry, cut small lengths of string, these will form the 'roots' of the leek. Once the paper is completely dry scrunch the kitchen roll into a ball and place at one end of the white section, fold the paper around it and start to roll into a tube. Unravel slightly and lay the string pieces as shown above, secure with sticky tape. Continue to roll the paper into a tube, and close with sticky tape (or a little double sided tape under the end).

And that's it, quite simple but hopefully should keep little hands busy for a good half an hour.