Craft ideas for 2yo please

[stclair]

Please help, what sort of crafty things should i be doing with my nearly 2yo dd? I'm pretty clueless with this sort of thing . . . we currently play with playdough, draw, and she loves stickers which end up anywhere. I'm guessing we should be doing much more?!

My dd is 20 months. last week I gave her 2 playdoh colours and a heart cutter. She cut some hearts and got bored. I left them to go hard, than later she painted them a bit. Left to dry, then added glue and glitter. They look fab!! I think its better to do things in stages for the short attention span.

I cut up old magazines, leaflets, catalogues and she spends ages sticking the pictures onto paper.

finger paints - ELC do a nice colourful box which don't seem to stain anything.

I save up old boxes, loo rolls etc and we stick them all together and paint them, stick things on them.

The cheap books like magic painting etc are good too, as are the colour magic pens/books.

The entertainer have a fab really big jar of crafty items on sale at the moment for £5.

Have you tried the cornflour/water thing?

She also likes drawing on her baby dolls faces but I wouldn't recommend that one :)

DD is 25 months BTW.

Put some double sided sticky tape on a bit of A4 card, go for a walk in the woods so she can stick all the bits of twigs, leaves etc on route. Mine used to love this I then put it in a4 sleeves and made a folder of different places.

Oh I like those ideas, thanks! I'm guessing big mess sheets on the floor for all the glue and paint! No, we haven't done the cornflour/water thing busymum - do we do anything with it once mixed or is it more for the scientific experiment?!

Marking my place to take advantage of some of the great ideas! I don't have a lot to add. In summer DS has giant chalks to do big drawing on the patio and then spends another hour washing it off.

we draw a lot - my dd has just turned two and loves to 'name her scribbles'

I have made up a box off stuff for collage but haven't been brave enough to let her loose with the glue yet! However one day when my ds was at pre-school, I just gave her the box and supervised. She loved playing with all the different bits, took up a good hour!

We paint although not often enough. I am ashamed to say it seems to take a lot of effort for not much time taken! I tried giving her paint to dip a biscuit cutter into (star shaped, tree shaped) and let her make patterns on the paper.

We once made handprints in clay then baked it so it went hard (you can get a good recipe for this type of clay online). The kids then painted them and I put the date on the back. A nice keepsake as well.

I feel bad I don't do this kind of thing more often. My ds (5) is not really into art & crafts although of course he is creative in other ways. My dd loves it but she is very messy. I don't want to let this put me off though and I don't want to sound completely anal!

I have bought some black card and some lovely acrylic bright pink paint. I also have some glitter gel and sparkly bits to stick on. I am hoping to make some thank you cards for her birthday presents but maybe I am being a bit ambitious!

addressbook get a small table you dont care about and do it outside in the garden with overalls on and a wet flannel nearby. Yes it does take more time preparing and clearing away than doing but they love it. Ive took some great photos too!

good idea cottonreels although it seems to rain everyday here (scotland)!

I am still going to do the thank you cards though. Just overalls and a cloth nearby!

You are right that the joy and learning they gain from even a small space of time is worth it. In the summer holidays I plan to do arts&crafts once a week at least.

How often do you do it?

of course it doesn't always have to involve glue and paint either

Today we made an ocean scene inspired by a recent trip to the aquarium for my dd birthday. We lay out some blue tissue paper on the floor and decorated with shells and pebbles. I have some foam and finger puppet sea creatures - lots of fun. I also got out the arts and crafts box again and various materials became sea creatures. A silky ribbon was like a slippery eel and a pom pom was a sea urchin. A ball of wool was sea weed. I just love how imaginative and creative kids are. I wasn't allowed to do any of this when I was a kid as my parents couldn't abide mess at all. I find it helps to lay some childhood ghosts to rest doing this with my kids as I also get to release some creative energy!

I suppose whilst I am far more relaxed than my parents, I could improve. Mumsnet is great for tips like this

pour some cornflour into mixing bowl and stir in small amounts of water until you get a very thick paste. It will look like a liquid but you can hold it like a solid. I admit, I love it more the kids :)

You can keep it a few days covered in the fridge, will just need a good stir!

I got this blog from here, loads of great ideas The imagination Tree

Thank you all for your ideas - so far I've been to the Entertainer and taken advantage of their 50% off craft tubs sale, started cutting out pictures from magazines, and stamped stamps onto paper yesterday. Must remember to save all the bits and bobs I normally put in the recycling ie bottle tops, paper towel tubes etc. Hmm, now to find somewhere to store all the stuff . . .

That is my problem. Piles of boxes, loo rolls, bubble wrap. If u come up with a solution let me know!!!

Set her up with a packet of spaghetti and jelly beans (or other terrible squidgy sweets) and let her build stuff...buildings or monsters or people etc. Beans are used as joints.

busymum Thanks for the Entertainer suggestion, not only did I get said jar full of arty stuff, but also managed to get DD's birthday present half price - wouldn't have gone in there otherwise