Butterfly
I bought these fruity cheerios for a fun craft at my daughter’s birthday party and decided to use them for a few more crafts and put it all together for you. These smell awesome! Which make them even more fun to use for crafts since they add a deeper sensory experience for kids. Each of these activities are distinct but so simple you could do them all in one day or spread over years!
Fruity O Sensory Tub
This was a fun colorful tub for my daughter to play with. Using the cheerios let her explore with scooping and pouring with something that although I don’t usually have it in her diet if she did ingest it I wouldn’t be concerned. I didn’t encourage her to eat this though as I treated it like any other sensory tub where we are not suppose to eat. I should note that she’s never been fed these so they were not immediately thought of as food. As with any activity with young kids this is only to be done under immediate supervision , only you know if your child is ready for an activity, look at your child’s abilities not the age recommendation.
- Gather your materials . You will need a container ( I love light ones for babies so if they pull it off the table by accident you have a mess but no injuries). You will need a few cups of fruity cereal and fun tools to scoop with . You may also want some painters tape.
- Add a few loops of tape to your table and tape down your tray.
- Add cereal.
- Add tools and toddler !
- Watch out for fast moving preschoolers too!
Fruity Flower
This was impromptu and as you will see it evolved as we went. My original vision was not what my son wanted to make , so we changed it up mid craft. I like his vision better anyway and the end result was a really fragrant flower!
- Gather your materials. You will need some fruity cereal, a paper plate, a sheet of colored paper, scissors and white glue.
- Start by gluing the paper plate in the middle of the paper and drawing the petals with glue.
- Add your cereal to the petals. Which he did… for a bit.
- He decided that just putting one color on each wasn’t “seriously cool” but if we filled the middle , that would be.
- So that’s what we did!
There are enough power struggles in every day life with preschoolers if they don’t like the craft and want to change it go with it, it’s great if they have an idea they want to make.
- Let it dry.
- Cut out.
Fruity O Butterfly Necklaces
I loved these Butterfly treats from TeachMama and knew when I decided to use a butterfly theme for my daughter’s first birthday party that I’d need a craft for the kids to do. So I changed it up a little by turning it into a necklace craft. The craft table was busy even though the sun was out at the party, and these are a fun craft to do any time.
- Gather your materials. You will need fruity O’s cereal, sandwich baggies, and some craft lace.
- Start by filling the baggies with a handful of cereal.
- zip it and separate the cereal to the edges.
- Wrap a cut piece of craft lace around the middle and tie.
- When making it into a necklace loop the craft lace through one o first to make an easy stopper so kids can string the cereal on without them zipping off the end.
- Lace and tie . At the party we had kids from 2-8 enjoying this craft.
I love what we call butterfly pasta. Not only does my son eat it well, he plays with it well too. We made this ages ago but between Easter and Mother’s Day crafts it got lost in the shuffle. As we pulled it out to play with it again I remembered I never posted this sensory activity. Although I didn’t photograph it I popped some of these butterflies into a clear Take and Toss sippy cup through a lid on it and my daughter has been using it as a shaker for weeks. So many uses!
- Gather your materials. You will need some bowtie ( butterfly) pasta, food coloring, vinegar, ziploc bags, cookie sheets, a medium sized plastic tub, scoops, a divided tray and play tongs. You can also through in some penne pasta as ” Caterpillars”.
- Start by putting a few drops of your favorite food coloring into a ziploc.
- Add 1 tbsp of white vinegar.
- Throw in a few handfuls of pasta. Shake until all the liquid is gone.
- Pour out on a cookie sheet lined with wax paper to dry. The vinegar smell will lessen in time, even if it’s strong initially in a day or two it will be all but gone.
- Make multiple colors.
- Pour dry dyed pasta into a bin with scoops for little ones to explore, add penne pasta as caterpillars.
- Using a divided tray you can sort the pasta by color using tongs.
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When I think of all the things I look forward to as the days get warmer and the flowers start blooming butterflies are at the top of my list. They are a fantastic spring theme for teaching life cycles, about bugs ( especially for those kinds not interested in creepy crawlies) and art lessons about mirror images. Oh and butterfly crafts are just fun and beautiful to make!
The Band Aid Butterflies were such a hit last year we made them multiple times, they are quick, low mess and kids get a kick out of using first aid supplies for a craft.
This butterfly offers lots of opportunity to use fine motor skills and makes a cute keepsake too.
Ok so this one is a dragonfly but it’s so pretty! Make a few adjustments and bam! You have a butterfly.
Ok another technicality these are actually lightning bugs but they could pass for butterflies!
Also check out these simple Butterfly Puzzles from my other blog on FamilyEducation.com
Need some books to go with these crafts? Check out our children’s book reviews.
My son is a wee bit obsessed with emergencies right now, he plays paramedic or firefighter multiple times a day. Every car ride is a ride in a firetruck … well you get the picture. So I decided to use his enthusiasm for first aid at craft time! This is such an easy craft and I think they turned out perfectly ! I love the variation in textures with the smooth band aids and the soft fluffy gauze.
- Gather your materials. You will need some band aids, gauze pads, markers and a piece of construction paper ( or recycled cardboard ! ).
- Start by decorating your butterfly wings ( the gauze) with a marker. We found that dotting the marker works best so the gauze didn’t get all stretched out.
- Open your band aids – this took a while but my son was very proud he did it independently.
- Next pinch the gauze, my son couldn’t do this step.
- Pop the band aids on. We did this step together .
- Add antennae with markers! I was so excited that he did this step, until now he would have had me do it insisting he couldn’t, both of us were proud that he did it with no help.
Need some books?
- Gather your materials. You will need 2 large leaves with stems, some cardboard, markers, tape, glue and googly eyes.
- Start by drawing a butterfly body on the cardboard.
- Have your child color it – red was the only color he wanted to use today.
- While they are coloring snip the stems off the leaves, don’t loose the stems they will be made into antenna in a bit.
- Cut the body out.
- Tape the antenna on underside of the head.
- Tape the leaves on as wings. Tape works way way better than glue since the leaves can still have some moisture , they can take forever to dry sometimes.
- Glue the googly eyes on add a smile!
Books
“Lucky Leaf” by Kevin O’Malley is a funny book about a boy kicked outside and off his video game by a parent and his quest for a lucky leaf. He waits and waits for the last leaf from a tree to fall, even after his friends give up and go home. The story is cute and my son thought it was funny. I liked the comic book format of the illustrations and the little boy’s dog has some pretty funny facial expressions throughout.
“Autumn : An Alphabet Acrostic” by Steven Schnur is a lovely book that is also a wonderful introduction into this form of poetry for young children. Each page has a poem about the season, from Acorns, to Owls to Pumpkins. Each letter of the words are a jumping off point for a sentence in the poem. The beauty of this book is that it reads well traditionally as well as individual poems which really makes it two books in one.
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