Looking for kids' easy Christmas crafts? These are quick and fun to make.
Jingling Christmas Garlands
Make these on Christmas Eve and hang them on the Christmas tree. On Christmas Day, everyone can wear one (not for children under 3 years beacuse of the small pieces) and jump around, jinging!
You'll need:
Clear jelly cord - cut into 90cm (1 yard) pieces, one for each garland.
12mm Star-shaped pony beads, in gold, red and green, about 50 beads for each garland
5mm gold ball beads - about 50 for each garland
20mm Gold coloured Christmas bells - 5 large or 10 small per garland.
You can buy all of these from craft shops.
What to do:
Put the beads and bells into bowls on the table. Give each child a length of jelly cord with a bead tied loosely at the end.
Show the children how to thread beads and bells onto the cords to make garlands. Let them choose their own colour combinations. Random colours look good. So do alternating groups of each colour (5 red, 5 silver, 5 red...)
When they've finished, untie the loosely tied bead, and tie both ends together in an overhand knot, leaving a little exra cord for the beads to move on. Trim the ends.
Hang all the garlands on the Christmas tree. On Christmas day, everyone can wear one.
Try different colour combinations. How about gold and pink glistening stars, with gold bells, as in the photo above? Or sparkly blue with silver bells? Dark and light green with gold bells? Your kids will have some great ideas about colours!
You could make smaller garlands to use as bracelets, or really go overboard with the idea, and string beads and bells in long chains to drape around the Christmas Tree.
To remind kids about the real meaning of Christmas, how about combining the star-shaped beads with a small wooden cross?
For an even simpler project knot a few gold bells onto 5mm red velvet ribbon to make necklaces. Simple, but effective.
