Birthday Cake Sensory Bin

This easy birthday cake sensory bin is perfect for any little aspiring chef! Made with homemade playdough and complete with loads of sprinkles and fake candles, this bin keeps preschoolers happily baking up something good!

After many years of mothering, I have learned that it is a good idea to have an activity planned for the afternoon. I usually have something set up for Harp like a paper craft or something she can get creative with, but lately we have been LOVING sensory bins. 

Harper loves to bake, so the idea for this birthday cake sensory bin came around. I thought she would love the chance to play with sprinkles, and I was right. When she came home from preschool, she was ready to get her hands into this bin! I have a feeling your little one will want to do the same should you recreate this project.

This was easy to assemble and super economical. You likely have all of the supplies on hand!

This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase I will earn a small commission at no cost to you.

Supplies:

1/2 cup of shampoo (any kind will do, including something from the dollar store!)

 2 tablespoons of water

1 cup of flour

Sprinkles

Silicone cupcake molds, small cake pans, small dishes for forming cakes. Your childs play food collection is a great place to find materials to use in this bin.

Washi Tape

Small Craft Sticks

A battery operated votive candle

Tissue Paper in orange, yellow or red

A baking dish or a bin with a lid

To make the birthday cake dough:

Add one cup of flour, 2 tablespoons of water and 1/2 cup of shampoo together in a medium bowl. 

Begin to stir, as the ingredients start to bind together, finishing mixing with your hands.

 If the dough feels sticky, you will add a little more flour, no more than 1/4 cup.

Test for stickiness. If the dough is still sticky, add a little more flour and continue to mix until it doesn't stick to your hands.

To make fake candles:

You will need a length of washi tape that can cover a craft stick on both sides.

Allow the tape to slightly overlap the craft stick and place small squares of tissue paper on the top of the stick. I layered orange and yellow tissue paper to resemble a flame.

Fold the tape up to cover the other side of the craft stick.

Trim the edges of the tape on the sides of the craft stick.

Trim your tissue paper to resemble a flame.

To assemble the birthday cake activity bin:

Pour a bottle of sprinkles in the bottom of the dish or storage container you plan to use.

Add the dough.

Add small dishes like play food dishes, silicone cupcake molds, small baking dishes.

Add the fake candles and a battery operated votive candle, if you have one.

Invite your child to explore the activity. They will form cakes, decorate with sprinkles and add candles to serve birthday cake!

Find more hands on play ideas here

In the Sky Bin

Sushi Bin

Play Doh Ideas

Easy DIY ipad Mini Stand

This easy diy ipad stand was made with only 3 supplies in just a few moments of time. It is a great tween or teen craft for a rainy day and provides a practical place to place your ipad for hands free viewing!

This was such a simple project! I needed someplace to place my ipad while cooking and
referring to a recipe, so I whipped this up in just about 3 minutes! I wasn't quite sure about how
sturdy it would be, but I was surprised by how sturdy it was, and how well it has held up over 2
weeks time.

Supplies

7 Jumbo Craft Sticks ( 5.86” x .72” )

Washi Tape

Hot Glue Gun

Directions



1) Apply washi tape to one side of 3 craft sticks.

2) Form a letter V with 2 of the washi tape covered craft sticks.

3) Secure the point where the sticks meet with hot glue.

4) Flip the craft sticks over so that you are working with the uncovered side of the sticks and your

point is now facing upwards.

5) Use an uncovered craft stick to attach a “leg” to the top, where the sticks meet.  To do this easily

give a generous dot of hot glue about ¼” below the top, immediately place your craft stick at a very

slight angle. Hold the craft stick in place for about 30 seconds, as the glue dries. This acts as your

base. Test it to make sure the base stands freely.

6) You have 3 remaining craft sticks that are not covered by washi tape; stack and glue these together.

7) Glue the final craft stick, with the washi tape on top of the stack you just made.

This will act as your ledge for holding your ipad.

8)You will glue these stacked sticks one inch from the bottom of the base.
Allow to dry for about a minute before using as an ipad or phone stand.

You can check out all of my easy DIY ideas here

Ribbon Tree Ornament Craft

I am so excited to decorate my trees this year! I have already been playing around with some cute handmade ornament ideas!

Today I have a really economical and adorable DIY ornament that I know you are going to want to make! It costs just about $2 to make a dozen of these! They come together so easily that making a dozen is no problem at all!

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These are cute for decorating a tree, or adding a little something to a wrapped gift!

To make these ribbon tree ornaments I used:

• A spool of ribbon I bought at Walmart for 97 cents
• Chunky Craft Sticks
• Glue
• Scissors
• Pencil

Directions:

• Begin by laying 4 craft sticks together, draw the outline of a tree on them.
• Cut the sticks to shape the tree.
• Cut the tiny top triangle from the scraps to avoid wasting a whole craft stick!
• Cut small bits of ribbon to cover the tree shapes. Glue them on and trim.

•  Now glue the ribbon covered craft sticks onto one more craft stick.

• After gluing all the sections on to the base craft stick, flip it over and add a small loop of ribbon so that you can hang it!

This is a fun project to do with the older kids, and these are really pretty lovely in their simplicity! I have a short video of the process to share with you. I would love it if you gave it a thumbs up!

I can't wait to hear what you have planned for holiday crafting!

You might also like these cute DIY Mickey Ornaments!

Easy Ribbon and Craft Stick Ornaments

This easy ribbon tree craft is a fun way to decorate your tree this holiday season. These are easy to make, economical and perfect for sharing with your friends and family!

This post contains affiliate links. If you click and purchase I make a small commission.

You can mix and match ribbon colors, or stick with one color, whatever you prefer. I used a thin strip of ribbon that fit perfectly with my chunky crafty sticks.

Supply List:

5 Craft Sticks

Glue

Ribbon

Scissors

A Pencil

Directions:

• Line up 4 craft sticks
• Lightly draw the outline of a tree on the craft sticks, as you can see we simply made slanted lines.
• Cut the craft sticks per the lines you made.

• I made a tiny pointy triangle from the scraps of craft sticks for the top of the tree.
• Cut and glue ribbon to fit the cut craft sticks.

• Trim the ribbon to fit.
• Now assemble your tree and glue it on to the remaining craft stick.

• Cut 6 inches of ribbon and form a loop, glue this to the back to act as an ornament hanger.
• Allow to dry, then hang from your tree, or share with someone special this holiday season!

These were so easy to make! Last year I added them to my wrapped gifts to add something extra to the presentation.

We have so many other fun Christmas ornament crafts you will want to check out. A few of our favorites include:

Mickey Mouse Jingle Bell Ornaments

Ribbon Tree Ornaments

Hand Print Fish Puppets

One of my favorite things about being a mom is to watch the pleasure my kids get from simple items. Last spring my husband cut out a photo of Colonel Sanders and glued it to a craft stick. He casually laid the Colonel on the table for the kids to discover at breakfast. They went wild over this! 

Last night after the kids were tucked into bed, inspiration hit me and I got busy crafting up something fun for them.  I hoped that the idea would inspire them to want to get crafty with me after seeing how fun these little puppets could be!

These are so easy to make. This is maybe a 3 minute project that will bring hours of entertainment. While entertainment is important, there are subtle and vital things happening when your kids engage in imaginative play. 

Benefits of Pretend Play

Pretend play allows the expression of both positive and negative feelings, and the modulation of affect, the ability to integrate emotion with cognition (Jent, Niec, & Baker, 2011; Seja, & Russ, 1999; Slade and Wolf, 1999).  Pretend play, fosters language development, thinking skills, and helps to develop emotional and social skills in children ages 2 thru 7. The creativity unleashed thru dramatic play has long-term benefits too. From problem-solving thru imaginary situations to the ability to express feelings.

Isn't it incredible to think that so many things can come from playing with a handmade puppet!?  Well, let's get to it and make one so the play time can begin!

Supplies needed

handprint cut out on colorful paper

small paper triangle

small paper heart

white school glue

a googly eye

craft stick

Directions

To begin, trace a hand and cut it out on colorful paper. 

I applied a little glue to affix the eye.

I also cut out a small triangle from another colorful paper and an oddly shaped heart for lips.

I applied a small amount of glue in the middle of the handprint for the small triangle.

I applied a small dot of glue for the heart paper for lips.

Next, add a little glue on the top of the craft stick and affixed it to the back of the handprint, in the middle of the handprint.

Allow the glue to dry and you have a fun fish puppet.

What Did the Kids Think?

The craft was well received with Harper, who took both of the fish puppets that I made and dashed off to play with them before her brother could see them. I chalked that up as a success.

Once Roo got a peek at the fish puppets he said, "Mom can you trace my hand?" That was all it took and the construction paper came out for handprint tracing.  After lunch today we are going to make a few of these together for an afternoon of crafting and puppet play!

Puppet play is a lot of fun for kids, but there is something almost magical about creating a puppet of your own design and bringing it to life via imaginative play. This project required the most simple of supplies and it can be completed in a matter of moments. There is no reason not to give it a shot with your kids! The benefits of simple projects like this that create an invitation to play are abundant, the mess from such a project is minimal and you likely already have these items on hand, or you could improvise with any paper or cardboard, tape and a straw if not!

Monster Hand-print Puppet

These hand print puppets are adorable and they will be a monstrous hit with your kids! They take the most basic of supplies and come together in a flash for a lot of fun for everyone!

We love to make puppets you guys. Harper and I can craft up a handful of puppets and she will spend the rest of the day, wrapped up in a world of her own dramatic creation! 

We decided that now was the perfect time to make a few easy peasy hand print monster puppets! These were fun because they ready to play with in a matter of moments and they were so cute!

Supplies

construction paper

pencil

scissors

squiggly eyes

craft stick

glue

marker

Trace a hand on construction paper.

Cut it out.

Glue on as many eyes as your child desires. We used 3.

Draw polka dots, hearts or whatever you like to give your monster a fun look.

Glue the craft stick on the back, leaving enough room for small hands to hold on to the stick.

There you have a fun handprint monster for Halloween dramatic play!

You might also like this hand print fish puppet idea.

Rainbow Coaster DIY

Craft sticks are a great addition to any crafters supplies! There are so many fun ways you can use craft sticks to create! I made this easy set of coasters in just a few moments. These are great for tweens and teens to make! They are fun and functional and make a cool DIY you can gift to a friend or relative!

This project is super simple. I got literally everything I needed at Dollar Tree to make these. I love economical crafting! To make this DIY  go a little faster I bought the craft sticks that were pre dyed.

The pack conveniently contained all colors I needed for a rainbow effect. You will need 20 craft sticks to make this project, use 3 of each color!

Line up your craft sticks in the pattern of a rainbow.

Then use hot glue to attach 3 sticks running in the opposite direction for supports, just like a pallet would have.

Repeat and make another one.

Then you are going to place a craft stick on its side to give the coaster height.

Carefully glue the stick on the sides then add a line of glue to the top of both side sticks and place the other section on the top.

This project was featured in a video on facebook. I would love to have you check it out and give it a thumbs up!

You can find more easy DIY ideas here
Easy Pencil Pouches

Find more rainbow craft activities here

You can also find it on youtube. Subscribe for more fun projects for the family!

Fine Motor Counting Activity

This easy activity is perfect for practicing early math while developing fine motor skills.

Before I was a mom, I was a developmental psychology major. In my studies, I was intrigued by sensory and fine motor development then. Now that I am a mom, I love setting up activities for my own kids that give them hands on fun and learning opportunities without spending a ton of money to do it.

This fine motor counting activity is perfect for preschoolers.They can work on their fine motor skills while practicing counting. You might have all the materials at home to do this, making it fuss free and frugal. If not, I have included some affiliate links you can use to get your supplies.

Supplies:
Rainbow Bands
Large Craft Sticks
Sharpies

Directions:
Write numbers on large craft sticks with sharpies.
Use the largest craft sticks you can find to make the activity challenging.
Offer your child small rubber bands, like the rainbow loom style of bands and encourage your child to count the number of bands that need to go on each craft stick and slide that number of bands on to each craft stick.

If you are looking for more fine motor activities for kids, check out these posts:
Unicorn Fine Motor Bin
Play Doh Pre Writing