Saturday, December 7, 2013

Simple Christmas Craft - 3D Cardboard Christmas Trees


I don't know who first came up with the idea of slipping two cardboard trees together to make them stand, but it's a classic for sure.

It's also the sort of craft I really love, because it gives the illusion of a messy and complicated project, without actually being messy or complicated.

So, before I cleaned up the cardboard left over from our cookie craft, I asked the older girls (and a friend who was visiting and needed something to do) to cut out a couple of trees each for the younger children.  There are templates all over the place online - we used one from a freebie math craftivity featured this month at TeachersPayTeachers.com (there are all kinds of great Christmas themed worksheets to be found over there right now - many of them free).

Anyway, once the girls were done with the trees, I cut alternating slits from the bottoms and tops of each pair, midway down...


...so they could be slipped together to make a standing tree - just like with the slip-together playhouse.


Then, I took them apart, for the children to paint green on both sides (the part that seemed messy, but with washable paint, and paper covering the table - really wasn't).


We left them to dry overnight (making them seem complicated), flipping them every once and a while, so the paint wouldn't stick to the paper.


 And, I gave them back to the children, to decorate with stick on jewels (of course any type of sticker would work - or even bits of paper to glue on).


Making for a great seems-like-a-lot-of-work-but-is-really-quite-easy kind of Christmas craft.  Now I just have to dig out our copy Hans Christian Andersen's The Fir Tree, and we'll be all set.


It's great to be a homeschooler.

4 comments:

Ticia said...

So, I'm really curious, what paint do you use because you get fairly good coverage when painting on cardboard and I always seem to need 5 layers for it not to be obviously painted cardboard.

An Almost Unschooling Mom said...

Ticia - We used "Crayola Washable Kids' Paint"

Natalie PlanetSmarty said...

Sometimes the simplest crafts are really the best. Your trees look very pretty!

Unknown said...

Adorably frugal, as usual!

(P.S. We received your pack 'o Christmas fun in the mail the other day, and I am every so grateful for your kindness! The Mad Libs will prove especially useful during our holiday travels!)