A New Series! Day 1: Fall Crafts for Kids: Handprint Turkeys

Welcome to day 1 of 31 Days of Easy Crafts for Kids!  I’m so excited to be participating in this 31 day challenge and I hope you’ll get as much out of it as I do!  When I was thinking about what to do for this blogging challenge, I was browsing my Pinterest boards and my past posts and it seems like crafts are a common theme.  I pin them, I dream about them, I even buy the supplies for them, but honestly, I seldom actually DO them.  Especially the crafts for kids.  The supplies just seem to sit as my want-to-be-Pinterest-mom-self is too busy with other things to make the crafts happen.

From this search came the theme of this 31 Days series!  I decided I would do these projects with my kids, post them here on my blog, and encourage you to do them with your kids as well!  To learn more, visit the landing page for 31 Days of Easy Crafts for Kids.  There, you’ll be able to find all the posts from the series!

Today’s post is a fun fall craft.  My girls had a great time doing this craft together…especially all the hand washing and the bath that followed!

Fall Crafts for Kids: Handprint Turkeys

Preparation time: ~5 minutes
Project time: ~30 minutes (+20 minutes for drying)
Project cost: $ Low
Parental involvement: Moderate
Inspiration: Handprint Turkeys at Meet the Dubiens

Supplies:

• Construction paper: You’ll need white, brown, red, and yellow
• Paints: I used Basic brand acrylic paints.  I liked how thick they were and they went on nicely without dripping.  You could use tempera paints as well though.  You’ll need five different colors.
• 5 Cotton balls
• Googly eyes
• Scissors
• Glue

Preparation instructions:

• Cut a circle about 6″ in diameter out of the brown construction paper for the turkey’s body.
• Cut a beak and feet out of the yellow construction paper.
• Cut a squiggly gobbler out of the red construction paper.

Step by step instructions:

• Squirt a nickle sized amount of paint onto your child’s hand.  Use the cotton ball to spread the paint evenly over the hand.
• Tell your child to spread their fingers wide and show them where to place their hand to print the turkey’s tail feathers.  If you have an older child, they can probably do this on their own.  With a younger child, you may want to press down on their hand to make sure it all gets printed evenly.
• Wash your child’s hand.  Repeat until all five colors have been used and you have some nice turkey feathers!
• Allow paint to dry.
• Place glue on back of the turkey’s body or let your child do it!  (This would be a great time to teach about how to use glue.  Instruct your child to place it on the paper and “write” like you would with a marker, not make a puddle.)
• Glue turkey body so it slightly overlaps the feathers.
• Glue on gobbler, beak, feet, and googly eyes.

Wasn’t that super simple?  It was easy (although messy), but my girls loved it!  If you try this craft project, I’d love to hear how you liked it!

Confession: I haven’t decided on crafts for all 31 days yet…so… Do you have any fall crafts for kids (or any season, actually!) you’d like to see me do here?  One you’ve been eyeing and would like to know more about?  Share it in the comments and I’ll give it a look!

If you decide to do this project, be sure to come back and tell me about it!  Take pictures and share them on my Facebook sharing post!  I’d love to see what you and your little ones are making together!