My Favorite Toddler Arts & Crafts
Coloring- Crayons and coloring books can be very entertaining to a toddler. The wide array of color is very exciting to a toddler. When your toddler realizes that they have control over where the colors end up at they enjoy this activity even more. Coloring books are cheap and have lots of neat pictures for your toddler to scribble all over.
Finger Painting- Toddlers love to get messy and this arts & crafts activity can certainly accommodate. You will need to protect your crafts area before allowing your toddler to finger paint. You can use sheets of old newspapers, plastic sheeting or just an old bedsheet to protect the area. After the area is safely protected, lay down a big sheet of paper and place several nice sized dollops of finger paint on the paper. Stand back and watch your toddler produce art!
Water Colors- Toddlers, from my experience, love to paint! Therefore, water colors are a great idea for toddler arts & crafts. Water colors are also much easier to clean up than other craft paints. Even if water colors get spread all over your diningroom table, by your excited toddler, they will wipe right off with warm, soapy water. A big sheet of paper, a small cup of water, water colors and a paintbrush are all you will need to keep your toddler happily busy while you snap many photos of them.
Paper Chains- Toddler arts & crafts would not be complete without paper chains. This activity can be very intriguing to a toddler. All you need is a pair of plastic safety scissors, a glue stick and several sheets of colored construction paper cut into long strips. Help your toddler glue the ends of a strip together to make a circle. Then thread the next strip through the first cirlce and glue it to form another circle. Keep doing this with each strip until you have a paper chain. Once the chain is complete, your toddler can use the chain as a belt, a necklace or just to drag around the house. I think my girls enjoyed the paper chains more after it was completed than they did while we were making it.
Homemade Play Doh- Homemade play doh is a very popular toddler arts & crafts idea. It is also very easy to make and could possibly interest your older children too. You can have your toddler help pour the ingredients into the bowl while you are making the play doh. If your toddler is old enough to know their colors then you could let them choose the colored play doh that they would like to play with. Afterwards, your toddler will love squishing their little hands into the play doh. To get you started I am including the recipe that I use, myself, to make homemade play doh. This recipe is also safe if your toddler decides to have a taste of it.
Homemade Play Doh
1 cup flour
1/2 cup salt
1 cup water
2 T oil
2 T cream of tartar
food coloring of your choice
Mix flour, salt and oil, and slowly add water. Cook over medium heat, stirring until dough becomes stiff. Turn out onto wax paper and let cool. Knead dough with your hands until it is proper consistency. You can use it as it is right now or divide it into balls and add a few drops of food coloring to make different play doh colors. You may also use colored fruit juices instead of food coloring to make different colors of play doh.
Always supervise any toddler arts & crafts project. Don’t forget to have your camera handy in order to capture those special moments with your toddler. They are only small for such a very short amount of time. Cherish it!
