Toilet Paper Roll Groundhog Day Craft

Happy Groundhog Day!  Here's a really fun craft that we did last year.  We made a pop-up groundhog who could come in and out of his toilet paper roll hole.

Toilet Paper Roll Chinese New Year Crafts

Today is Chinese New Year, one of the most important holidays in the Chinese culture.  The celebration begins on the first day of the first month of the traditional Chinese calendar and ends with a lantern festival on the 15th day.  Here are a few crafts you can make to celebrate in your own home!

Toilet Paper Roll Dragon

Cardboard Tube Fire Breathing Dragon

Toilet Paper Roll Chinese Lantern

Cardboard Tube Turkey Feathers

Turkey Feather Supply List: 1 toilet paper roll, construction paper, google eyes, glue, scissors, feathers

Begin by cutting 5 or 6 slits on the end of your toilet paper roll about 1 inch long.  Bend them back so the stick out.

Pick out 5 or 6 different colored feathers.

Glue your feathers onto the pieces of the toilet paper roll. 

Cut a circle from some construction paper and add a beak and some google eyes.

Glue your face onto the front your toilet paper roll.

Toilet Paper Roll Grateful Gobbler

Grateful Gobbler Supply List: 1 toilet paper roll, construction paper, stapler, google eyes, markers, glue stick

Start by gluing on a beak and google eyes.

Cut out feathers from different colored construction paper.  Write on it things that you are grateful for.  Incidentally, Cole did choose to write Kiley (his sister) without be prompting him.  I love that he was grateful for crayons and markers!

Lay out your feathers and place your toilet paper roll on top.  Staple the feathers to the toilet paper roll.

Toilet Paper Roll Handprint Turkey

Handprint Turkey Supplies: 1 toilet paper roll, construction paper, paint, brush, glue, scissors, google eyes

Paint your hand and fingers using some different color paints.  I let Cole pick which paints he wanted to use.

Make your handprint on the construction paper and then repeat with the other hand.

Allow your handprints to dry and then cut them out.

Glue your hand, beak and eyes to your toilet paper roll and you turkey is ready to go.

Halloween Monster Toilet Paper Rolls

 Monster Supply List: 1 toilet paper roll, paint, various monster embellishments

 Begin by tucking in one side of your toilet paper roll and painting it.

 Allow to dry and decorate with your various embellishments.  We ended up making 3 monsters.  One for Cole, one for Kiley and one for me.

Cute Kid Toilet Paper Roll Mummies

 Mummy Supply List: 1 toilet paper roll, picture of a cute kid, first aid gauze, glue scissors

 Cut the pictures of your cute kids so that just their adorable little faces are showing.  Glue them to the toilet paper roll and allow to dry.  As you can see from this picture I used some of my hair bands to keep them in place while the glue dried.  

Cut your gauze into strips.  You can also use the rolls of gauze, but we didn't have any of that in the house.

Wrap the gauze around your toilet paper roll leaving the cute little faces peeking out.

Book Suggestion: In The Runaway Mummy a little mummy tells his mom he's going to run away.  As she pursues him he transforms into a series of different monsters.  This book is a great one to read around Halloween.

Cardboard Tube Spooky Spider

 Spider Supply List: 1 toilet paper roll, paint, 4 pipe cleaners, glitter glue, google eyes

 Paint your toilet paper roll and allow to dry.  Add some google eyes and glitter glue.  Thread your pipe cleaners through the bottom of the toilet paper roll to make some legs.

 

Book Suggestion:  Halloween Bugs: A Trick or Treat Pop Up Book is a pop up book that we've had for a while and I love bringing it out at Halloween.  My kids love the cute bug pictures, and the funny text. 

Halloween Pumpkin

 

Pumpkin Supply List: 1 toilet paper roll, orange paint, green and brown construction paper, black marker, glue

Begin by painting your toilet paper roll with orange paint and allow to dry.

Cut some leaves and a stem out of your construction paper.

Glue on your leaves and stem and draw a face on the front of your pumpkin.

Book Suggestion: Based on the folktale "The Turnip", Big Pumpkin is a great story about a witch who grows a pumpkin that is too big to get off the vine.  This was another great find that we brought home from our local library.

Toilet Paper Roll Bat

Bat Supply List: 1 toilet paper roll, black paint, construction paper, google eyes, glue, scrap of white paper

Begin by painting your toilet paper roll with black paint and allow to dry.

Cut some wings out of your black construction paper.

Add some glue to your wings and lay the painted toilet paper roll on top.

Add google eyes and a few fangs and your bat is ready to fly around the house.

Book Suggestion: Stellaluna isn't necessarily a Halloween book, but it is one of our all time favorites. My kids both love the part at the end of the book where Stellaluna is reunited with her mom.  When I was pregnant with my daughter Kiley, Cole decided he wanted to name her Stellaluna.

Toilet Paper Roll Mummy

Mummy Supply List: 1 toilet paper roll, glue, google eyes, scissors, marker, first aid gauze

Begin by cutting all your gauze into strips.  You could also use the roll of gauze, but this is what we had in the house.  Put glue on your toilet paper roll and wrap a few layers of the gauze around the outside.

Add your google eyes and a mouth and let dry overnight.

Book Suggestion: We checked out Halloween books from the library this week and Where's My Mummy? was one of the ones we picked.  Little Mummy doesn't want to go to bed and spends some time running around looking for his Mama Mummy.  My kids loved the other Halloween characters that he ran into.

Paper Towel Roll Flag {Flag Day}

Happy Flag Day!  Here's an easy little craft to help celebrate the birthday of the American Flag.

Flag Supply List: 1 paper towel roll, sheet of construction paper, packing tape, scrap paper, glue, scissors

Cut strips of paper from your scraps and glue them down on your large sheet.

Use your packing tape to adhere the paper to the paper towel roll.

Wave your flag all over the house!  We loved this craft and it was simple and required little drying time.  It would be a great activity to do with a large group of kids.  I think we might adapt it to create an American Flag for the 4th of July.

Book Suggestion: We checked out F Is For Flag at the local library and it was a great find.  Flags are everywhere, but this book talks about how a flag can have many meanings.