Upcycled DIY Tulip Bouquet: Mother’s Day Gift Idea for Toddlers
Got endless amounts of time for craft projects with your little ones? Then this probably isn’t the project for you. If instead, you enjoy spending some time at the art table with the kiddos but don’t have time (or desire) to plan and prepare elaborate art projects, you’re in the right spot! Check out this really quick and super simple flower bouquet the boys and I made for (Grand)Mother’s Day.
If you’re not into hunting and gathering to prepare for art projects at all but still want to get a little creative with your little ones, check out more about Green Kid Crafts. They do all the heavy lifting for you, so you can focus on just the fun parts!
This bouquet project is not high end or glamorous. It’s the perfect little project though for a two and half year ago and his very busy mom to spend a little time together with creative juices flowing!
After dyeing eggs around Easter, I held on to the little egg carton. We only dyed six eggs, which was plenty for T. Though I should probably confess that I ate one before we dyed them, so he really only got to dip five eggs in the infamous coloring substance. In any case, I upcycled the old egg carton. Along with some paint, scissors, and three green pipe cleaners, we made a tiny little tulip bouquet for the boys to bring to Grandma for Mother’s Day.
Supplies
Egg carton
3 pipe cleaners
acrylic paint (colors of your choice)
paint brushes (or paint sponges)
scissors
Step 1: Cut out each section of the egg carton. These will be your flowers. I didn’t go crazy perfecting each one. T had about zero patience as he itched to get into the paint, so I got him those “flowers” as quickly as I could.
After about five or ten minutes of painting, T got a little sidetracked. He found it much easier to paint himself than the egg carton pieces. He also wanted to paint the cars on newspaper to “make them dirty” so he could “wash them with water” and clean them. While I endured the painted newspaper, rest assured he never got his chance to “wash” them. I’m not that crazy!
I got him back on track, temporarily…
… until he could no longer resist the urge to paint himself. This self-art project took all of about seven seconds to complete. I’m pretty sure I blinked and found this when I opened my eyes. If only he could have painted the egg carton pieces as fast as he painted himself.
Step 2: After letting the egg carton pieces dry for several hours, I poked a hole in the bottom of each one and stuck a green pipe cleaner throughout. I folded over the pipe cleaner a bit on the inside of the egg carton cup (a.k.a. “flower”) so it stayed put.
My plan to keep that little bouquet neatly intact lasted only as long as my efforts to keep the bouquet away from J. Tearing apart the entire bouquet, including ripping the flowers off of each pipe cleaner “stem” took all of about 1/3 of a second. Seriously, he destroyed each flower so fast I didn’t even have a chance to stop him on the first couple executions.
Despite the distractions, the flowers survived four little reckless hands and a flight from Chicago to my parents’ house for a spring visit. Grandma received her (Grand)Mother’s Day bouquet a couple of weeks early, but at least it arrived in one piece.
The whole project took all of about 30 – 45 minutes from start to finish including preparation and clean up. I already had many of the supplies on hand (because I do have a small art project stash for the boys), but I loved that the project required no upfront investment on my part.
Given that the boys are so young still, any upfront effort often seems to leave me disappointed. Projects with toddlers never go as planned (what does with a two-year-old), so I don’t have the heart to invest a lot of time in something that won’t likely hold his attention for longer than ten minutes (which includes the time he spent painting his own body).
Do you do art projects with your little ones? Do you have any great simple ideas that can work for any mom on any budget even with just a smidgen of time?
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