Cozy Up with Cost Effective Winter Crafts

Let’s face it, it’s been a pretty bummer year for ‘real snow’ activities in the Midwest but that doesn’t mean you have to ‘snow blow’ a lot of cash traveling to Vail for skiing! You can have plenty of winter fun right here in your own kitchen!

Science Fun: Add together science+winter and it = frosty fun!

Ice Swirl Gift Wrap The only downside to this one is that you have to purchase Tye Dye ink.

Snow Candy If the weather isn’t cooperating for this one, you can use shaved ice instead.

Snow Volcano We made ours out of Kinetic sand last summer and worked it in with our ‘dinosaur’ theme day. The snow-cano uses the same ingredients- baking soda, vinegar, and food coloring but you build your volcano base out of snow. If the weather is not cooperating you can use white Kinetic sand, white Play Doh, or sub in some ‘home made snow’ (see recipes below)

Make Your Own Snow I’ve found at least five different recipes for making snow. The base ingredient is the same- baking soda. Then you mix it with water or hair conditioner, and it forms this mushy fun ‘snow like’ substance that is great for sensory play time. The best part is, you don’t need mittens to play in it.

Learn Your Shapes with Penguins: We stole this idea from the local preschool at the nature center. All you need is some construction paper, cotton balls, scissors, and glue sticks and your toddler will have a blast learning their shapes: oval for the body, heart for the face, triangle for the wings etc. as well as practice fine motor and scissor skills.

Spoon Snowmen I love that this little guy can be made out of an old disposable spoon, pipe cleaners, construction paper, and just a dash of t-shirt paint.

Melted Snowman Painting: My kids made these at daycare one year. It’s a genius idea for babies and toddlers since there’s no wrong way to smear your white fingerpaint around. Even the littlest of kids (with some assistance to prevent them from eating the small pieces) can stick on the eye stickers and the orange popsicle stick nose.

‘Hot Coco’ Baristas: This idea came from the park district and is brilliant if you have some old coco pebbles cereal sitting around that the kids won’t eat. Mix it together with mini marshmallows and let them have a blast pouring it into disposable paper cups. Then top your ‘hot coco’ with cotton ball ‘whip cream’ and ‘serve’ it to your customers.

For more snow-tatsic winter activities and crafts check out: Free Things to do When the Snow Comes Through and Cold Weather Cabin Fever Craft Corner

Happy crafting!

Cheers!

Love,

Marie