Spiderman handprints

It's finally superhero week! I purposely scheduled this for summer when my summertime daycare kid would be here. It's also Sutton's birthday week and all of the kids are into super heroes. In fact, Sutton will have a PJ Masks birthday cake for her party this weekend.

Today's project was a Spiderman handprint. After stamping each hand red (Lucian's the only child who painted his own hand red), I thought how quickly that had gone. It took much longer to finish the second part though.

After the red handprints were dry, I added white eyes. While the kids ate lunch (and the paint was dry), I added in the webs, and spider with a black sharpie. The kids were quite surprised I turned that red handprint into a spider!


Our Super hero book today was 10 Rules of Being a Superhero by Deb Pilutti. The book is fun, with great illustrations.

Handprint ducks

This morning we made handprint ducks. I did change things from what Crafty Morning had done.

First, we painted handprints (minus thumbs). 

Then, I painted in the head, beak and feet. The kids put an eye on each duck.

I don't have cool, puffy feathers like they used on the link I posted to. I cut pieces off bigger craft feathers and we glued those on to each duck.

Hand and footprint flowers

This weeks theme is flowers. This morning we made some really sweet hand and footprint flowers. I found the idea on Learning As We Grow.

First, we painted each child's feet green and stamped them on their paper. Next we stamped their hands on the paper in two different colors.

My kids wanted to make flowers for their dad and grandma, so they actually did an extra set each. 

Lastly, once all their hands and feet were clean I added green stems and some blades of grass with the edge of a painting sponge. 

Handprint dinosaurs

We made a different handprint dinosaur today. I attempted to draw a stegosaurus shape, and then the kids handprints finished it off.

First, I drew out the shape of the body and cut them out. Then, the kids helped glue them to white paper and we added an eye. 

Lastly, I painted the kids hand green and they placed them on the dinosaur. Fairly easy (minus my crude drawing skills), but turned out really cute. 

Dinosaur footprints

This week our theme is "dinosaurs." Our first craft project was going along smoothly until I realized I had placed the kids' feet backwards and had to start over! We made dinosaurs out of footprints.

Even with starting over, this was a very fast project. I painted each kids feet (which they find ticklish and funny). Placed them on the paper and did the next kid. 

They glued an eye on and then I drew in some teeth with a sharpie. 

Handprint Spiders

We are talking about spiders today. We've been singing and reading "Itsy Bitsy Spider" and made easy handprint spiders.

My kids attempted to paint their own hands, and then I finished painting them. We painted each hand, minus the thumbs for this.

The palms overlap and the four painted fingers created eight legs.

We added eyes and a web string for the spider to hang on after the handprints were done.

Handprint caterpillars

This week our theme is "bugs." Lucian actually saw a handprint caterpillar on Pinterest so that was what we made today.

We did one handprint a a time, letting each dry for 10-15 minutes before doing the next.

After the last handprint I added blue circles for the head.

When those were dry Sutton and I added eyes to each one and I cut them out. 

I used a paper punch to put a hole in each one and a pipe cleaner created antennae.

Easter baskets

It's spring break week here, so I have an extra daycare kid (age 5). Today I had the four kids paint or color an Easter basket from a template I printed out from here.

Then, they used their fingers to fill their baskets with dots (eggs), and color in the bows. Some got quite messy, like Sutton's. She said her eggs exploded. :)

Two of the books we read today are 2 of my favorite Easter books. 

You can get both from Amazon. Happy Easter, Mouse! (If You Give...) by Laura Numeroff, and 10 Easter Egg Hunters: A Holiday Counting Book by Janet Schulman. Both are easy to read, and hold the attention of young children.

Leprechaun handprint

I've been trying to explain leprechauns to my kids this week. They know about fairies and elves, so I think they understand leprechauns are part of that magical world. Today's project was to make leprechaun handprint art.

First, I painted each kids hands tan and brown. After they stamped their hand on the paper I painted a bit of brown hair on top. When they dried a bit I added a green hat, and the kids glued eyes on. 

After they finished drying, I used a Sharpie to draw in a mouth and nose. Then I used scraps of construction paper to make a band for the hat. 

Hen and chicks handprint art

We did a simple hand print project today for our last day of farm week.

Each kid made a hand print and four fingerprints.

I went back and used markers to add in eyes, legs and beaks. This is a cute farm week craft or would work well for Easter too.

Valentine's Hearts

It's been a rough week here, so we haven't been following our schedule. We did make some Valentine's Handprint Hearts today though. I followed this template for the print outs, and then stamped lots of little hands. My kids made one each for me, one for Daddy and Grandma and Grandpa too.

These were super easy. Print the template and glue to construction paper, then get two little handprints on them. 

Lightning McQueen Foot & Palm prints

Lucian loves Lightning McQueen. When I saw a pin on Pinterest of a Lightning McQueen hand/footprint I knew we had to try it. It would've been a lot easier if I had any artistic skill!

First we did a footprint, and then placed a palm print over it.

Then I worked on adding in the face and wheels, one color at a time in between housework and doing things with the kids. The kids watched maybe 15 minutes of a video called "All About Trucks" before returning to playing. 

After the paint was dry I used a red marker to highlight around the eyes and mouth.

And ta-da - Lightning McQueen!

Handprint mittens

Continuing with our hats and mittens week, we made these simple handprint mittens this morning. These would be a cute Christmas craft also.

I used the template provided and printed them out on some bright green paper. Each child did their handprint and I filled in their name. This would be cute if they were laminated as ornaments as well. I decided to put magnets on the back of ours, since our artwork display is very full and I'm having a hard time parting with some of my favorite snowman, penguin and other winter artwork.

Cardinal handprints and a winter worksheet

Did you ever start a project and then part way through you ask yourself, "Whose idea was this anyway?" This handprint project was one of those instances.

Three little kids running around, a lack of artistic talent, and what I assume is carpal tunnel does not make for a fun painting project. The cardinals themselves were quick and easy, it was the branches I struggled with. 

I painted each kids hand and we put them on paper. By the time I got that done I was able to put a beak and eye on. After a break I came back and painted branches. Another break (to play) and I finished the branches. 

While I was helping each kid get their handprint, my two also did a worksheet placing snowmen in order of shortest to tallest. 

Christmas Tree Footprints

Star.Today we made cute little hand and footprint Christmas trees.

First I did their footprints and added the stump and star. 

When it was dry the kids used their fingers to create the lights all over the tree. 

I did them on 8x10 canvases so I could have them to hang in future years. I got a bundle of cheap canvases at Michael's on Black Friday so we could do projects like this. 

Turkey feet

This morning we made turkeys using the kids footprints and some feathers. 

I've learned the easiest way to do footprint art with the kids is to have them sit down and then I paint their foot with a brush. There is usually lots of giggling involved because the brush tickles. 

Once they were dry (a few minutes) the kids helped glue the feathers on. This was a really quick project compared to the other two we did this week. 

Handprint turkeys

After a busy weekend it's nice to get back into our week day routine.

This week our theme is turkeys. 

Today we made these adorable handprint turkeys. We did two colors, and then let them dry a bit before doing the second set of colors.

 I cut out all the turkey parts, and Sutton helped with the glue. Lucian said these turkeys turned out "awesome."

Later in the week we will be making footprint turkeys using feathers.