Kids Craft for Thanksgiving

My kids just love doing crafts!  They get it from their mom.  So since this week is Thanks Giving here are some more fun Thanks Giving crafts we did together.  On a piece of construction paper we drew a turkey and the words "I am Thankful for...", and every day we'll have our 5 year old write his own thing he is thankful for, and we'll write down what our 3 year old is thankful for, so come Thursday they are really in the spirit of Gratitude.  Then with a piece of yellow construction paper, and a strip of green construction paper, tape, 4 craft sticks, and 2 sheets of pre-printed Pilgrims and Native Americas we set up our second craft.  My kids colored the man and the woman Pilgrim and Native American, then cut them out and taped them to craft sticks to make puppets.  Then to carry them in, we made cornucopias by folding over the ends of a yellow piece of construction paper to make a cone and taped the ends together.  The strip of green paper is the handle.

We do this in conjunction with our Gratitude Tree during our Daily Circle time.  Our Gratitude tree is being decorated with Owls and cloth leaves this month.  Its a daily thing, but really extra special during Thanks Giving Month.

Thanks Giving Craft

Example from book

 Today was a really fun craft day.  We made more Thanks Giving crafts before my library books have to be returned.  We made two crafts.

1. Leaf collages.  My kids and I took an hour nature walk/hike/bike ride through the abandoned golf course in our back yard land.  Its open and the paved path is mostly in tact.  There are hundreds of trees, so we took 2 plastic bags and each child collected different types, colors, and sized leaves.  Then I gave them each a big piece of construction paper and the Elmer's glue.  They covered the paper in glue and put their leaves on how ever they wanted.

2. Paper chain turkeys.  We cut 5 pieces of 8x11 brown construction paper into strips.  Each child stapled about 15-17 brown strips together to form a paper chain.  Then the choose their back ground paper color, then we cut out potato shaped turkey bodies from brown construction paper, drew eyes, a beak and the gobbler, and had the kids color them if they wanted.  Then we cut out feathers in the colors they wanted.  We glued the turkey body in the middle of the paper, stapled the paper chain around the turkey body, and glued the feathers on around the outside of the paper chain.  It was fun, easy on the budget, and easy to clean up after.