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Cute & Easy Crafts for Kids

Kids Get Crafty – Acorn Animals

acorn crafts There seems to be an explosion of nature crafts on Red Ted Art at the moment.. first we made our Nature Bag, then we finished our Get Crafty with Nature ebook, then we made acorn elves and fairy houses… and now.. now we have acorn animals for you! Hooray! The great thing about fresh acorns, is that they are quite soft, so small hands can manage making holes too (compared to chestnuts, which can be a little tricky). I used to make variations of these as a child. We made a horsey and some sheep… now the horse can be made whilst out and about (though it helps to have a toothpick or maybe a pen in your pocket) and the sheep need to be finished at home, thanks to the “wool”.

I now feel as if I should tell you a wonderful story about a horse and a sheep, as I don’t have a book about one. But I don’t have a wonderful story either. So you get a Limerick that I just made up. I once got a Girl Guide badge thanks to Limericks!

There once was a horse and a sheep.

Who thought that they couldn’t find sleep.

So they ran up and down

All over the town

Until finally with sleep they did meet.

OR how about:

There once an acorn did fall

It really did not like that at all

Then a little boy came

Who brought it some fame

By making it into a wonderful doll

Fancy making a Limerick up? Go on! I challenge you… leave me one in the comments. You would make my day!

The Craft

A wonderfully straight forward craft. At this time of year many acorns are still green and those that have dropped to the ground are still quite soft.

Take two acorns, and one long thin twig, use you toothpick to create holes and later add cotton wool with glue!

acorn animals

1. Do check which way round your acorn will look best – we like that our animals have little “chests”… Use your toothpick to prick for holes at the bottom of one acorn and one on top. Insert 5 little sticks broken off from your long thin twig. Prick another hole in the “head” acorn and place on top. If you have a horse, add two more little twigs for ears… If you don’t have a toothpick a pen *may* be enough to prick the beginning of the hole and make the insertion of a twig easier.

acorn sheep

2. If you are making a sheep, add lots of glue! Red Ted loved making these. Whilst Pip Squeak loved taking hers apart.

acorn horse

3. Draw on eyes.

acorn animals

Ta Da!

acorn animals

Red Ted skipped outside and placed them in the fairy house!

We then made a little car:

acorn car

But it “disappeared” before I got  a photo of it all finished (this shows the “underneath”).

Filed Under: Autumn, Kids Craft, Nature 53 Comments

Comments

  1. Annie says

    Great idea ! Bean and Ozzy have been stashing acorns in their bedroom from walks all week – now we can do something with them ! I’ll get my thinking cap on and see what we can come up with to make and join in !

    Reply

  2. Red Ted Art says

    Just start making “our” ones… and I bet you will suddenly be making a huge range of other creatures… the kids will start demanding 🙂

    Reply

  12. Red Ted Art says

    Aaah you guys are so sweet! Was a little worried you would find them “boring”… but obviously not! *Phew* 🙂

    Reply

  19. techno-mole says

    Great use of acorns, we’ve been collecting them for projects like this, we also find conkers are good for this sort of thing, we used them to make spiders for halloween last year 🙂

    Reply

  20. mummiafelice says

    I ALWAYS miss the link ups. I must pull my finger out. I am shocking!!

    I saw some acorns whilst we were conker picking *rolls eyes* and wondered what they could be used for…. now I know! Fab idea 🙂

    Thanks for linking up 😀

    Reply

  23. Rashmie @MommyLabs says

    Oh, Maggie – these are super cute! We love nature art and craft and have saved our acorns, pine cones and shells from our recent trip, to make something.

    BTW, I loved your limericks. The second one especially… 🙂
    I too used to make these in school days and bagged some prizes! I still love making for my daughter..!
    It’s weird how we suddenly find two people can relate with each other over small and inane things…!

    Reply

  28. Aly says

    We’ve been collecting pine cones, acorns, hazel nuts, feathers etc for a similar project for your Autumn Get Crafty.I’m actually getting the kids involved this time.

    Reply

  29. Tracey M says

    I finally have a craft with matching books post and can link up! I love all the fall crafts in the linky this week. The acorn animals are so cute. For some reason, i could not copy your badge html, it wouldn’t let me so I had to type it by hand 😉 Thanks for hosting the link up!

    Reply

  31. Red Ted Art says

    Tracey – Oooh hooray! So excited that you can take part! 🙂
    Aly – look forward to your Autumn Get Crafty creation!!
    Mister Jeremey – the nests sound fun! Can’t wait to see them!

    Reply

  37. Theresha Ashley says

    I did not realize how many of your nature crafts I was using. Thank you for your generous sharing of your talents. My mother was always looking for crafts to keep us busy and entertained. I shared with my children. Thank you for expanding my grand-daughters world so wonderfully. They love the many great awesome hours of fun you have given all of us. Thank You and the other awesome people who have made so many wonderful crafts.

    Reply

Trackbacks

  4. […] that I remember well from early childhood.. mainly we would make little animals, similar to the acorn critters from last […]

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  8. […] made the little people the same way as we made these acorn animals. The baby’s cot is made from a chestnut […]

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  9. […] crafts out there that do not involve mess! For example, now with Fall on the way, why not make some Acorn Animals? Or an Autumn Mobile? Or you can teach them VERY basic sewing skills, by making these easy Lavender […]

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