Hello! I am a mum of 3 boys. This is our blog – sharing all our crafty makes and adventures together.
40 Tuff Tray Play Ideas
The popular Tuff Tray is such a versatile resource to have for children at home or in your setting. With or without a stand it can be used for many small world set ups and containing messy play, adventures and crafts. We show 40 of our best tuff tray play ideas. Some great invitations to play.
13 recycled craft ideas for children
Turn your old cardboard boxes, egg boxes and toilet roll tubes into creative treasures that provide hours of fun and play. Upcycled and recycled crafts are cheap and often simple to make with a little imagination. Here are our 13 recycled craft ideas for children to make and play with.
24 easy lockdown craft and activity ideas for children
Whilst spending so much time at home with our children it can be difficult to provide varied, stimulating and engaging projects for them to do. Here is our top 24 lockdown craft ideas and activities for children to do at home.
Nature Trail Collections and Natural Sensory Play in a Tinker Tray
In the warm Spring sunshine we love to go on nature trails to collect an array of beautiful things! We really try hard to listen to the birds, the leaves rustling in the trees, birds singing and the crackling of twigs under our feet. We love collecting and displaying items in our tinker tray, where we can sort and arrange our treasures!
Fairy Small World Play in the Tuff Tray
Fairies are a popular theme. We love tuff tray play ideas. Our tuff tray gets used for a variety of activities and themes. This time is was small world play with fairies and our recycled cardboard treehouse.
Dinosaurs Bones
A great topic for boys and girls! My boys love Dinosaurs so I bought some shaped biscuit cutters which included the bone structures of them! We decided not to make biscuits – but used Air Dry Clay instead!
Egg Box Finger Mouse
These recycled egg box finger mice are super cute and easy to make. You can then play with your Finger Mouse, creating small world play scenes and whole families of mice!
Tuff Tray Play – Planting Seeds
The Tuff Tray is an ideal place to gather all the items you need for planting seeds. Then make messy mud pies once the planting activity is finished!
Exploring Circles and Basic Fractions
Our topic this morning was circles. How many circles can you find and identify? Followed by Pizza making with basic fractions and finally we set up a small world based around a circle.
Egg Box Chinese Dragon
A lovely simple craft for Chinese New Year. Create this lovely Egg Box Chinese Dragon to display in your setting year after year.
Air Dry Clay Christmas Decorations
These are so easy to do and my boys really enjoyed this one. They make ideal handmade Christmas gifts for teachers and family members. Ours will be wrapped in tissue paper to give out at school and for Christmas Day.
Let it Snow Scrabble Christmas Decorations
These scrabble letter Christmas decorations are really simple to make and look great on the tree – they also make great little Christmas gifts.
How to make a Fairy Princess Wand
I borrowed my little niece for this activity, as I have 3 boys and none were interested in this craft project! I have a love for all things fairy, princess, sparkly and pink….so these tick all the boxes!
Christmas Reindeer Chocolate Crispies
These deliciously cute Reindeer Chocolate crispies are a favourite of ours at Christmas time. We usually make a batch to take with us when visiting family or for family parties.
Peg Doll Pom Pom Fairy
Pom Poms are really simple to make and by adding a traditional wooden peg and a few extra details, you can make these gorgeous Peg Doll Pom Pom Fairies to hang from your Christmas tree!
Small World Christmas Scene in a Jar
Recycle old glass jars to create miniature snowy scenes. Make them twinkle with mini fairy lights or battery operated tea lights.
Christmas Cork Characters
We love our recycled cork characters and these Christmas Corks are a lovely craft for the run up to Christmas. The Nativity Scene takes pride of place on our Fireplace and it is especially lovely as it was made by hand by us as a family.
Recycled Cardboard Christmas Town Display Scene
This lovely recycled cardboard Christmas Town scene looks great in a window or as part of a display. We re-used a large cardboard box for this large scene but you could use smaller boxes and piece them together.
Stop Motion Animation Winter Scene
We love creating small world scenes, but why not add an extra level of learning by incorporating ICT into the mix? Create your own basic stop motion animation. You can do this with Lego set ups or any small world scene that you create in any theme.
Cotton Reel Bobbin Christmas Elves
These recycled cotton reel bobbin Christmas elves are really cute and you can get really creative making all kinds of Characters.
Papier Mache Dragon Egg
Papier Mache is a great medium to work with, we use it quite a lot and have made Caves, Volcanoes, and Dragon and Dinosaur eggs. This time, we have made a Dragon Egg, although it can be easily re-purposed to a Dinosaur Egg.
Recycled Toilet Roll Tube Ninja Turtles
Toilet roll tubes are ideal for simple crafts. From characters to Christmas decorations and crackers to car garages and castles – recycling these everyday household items is a great way to start crafting. Here, we made Ninja Turtles!
Papier Mache Volcano
This Papier Mache Volcano was made for a creative homework as part of a school class themed project.
Wand Making Craft
The Harry Potter craze has had a huge impact in our house. My eldest loves all things Harry Potter, and I have to admit as do I! These handmade Magic Wands are easy to make and so effective.
Great Fire of London – Story in a Shoe Box
Creating a small world in a shoe box is a lovely, manageable craft project for children. This simple but effective story in a shoe box – depicting The Great Fire of London was done for my 8yr olds Creative Homework Project for school.
Recycled Toilet Roll Tube Light Up Castle
A simple budget-friendly recycled toilet roll tube castle – using readily available items such as toilet roll tubes and paint. Find out how we made ours here:
Egg Box Flower craft
Egg box flowers are so simple, and yet so beautiful. Once made, the flowers can be used in a variety of ways. Find out below how we made ours and what you can do with them.
Magical Dream Jars
These magical dream jars were inspired by the Roald Dahl Dream Jars. They are really simple to make and children can choose and fill their own jars with whatever takes their fancy. Dragons, Unicorns, Mermaids, Fairies, Pirates.
Inspiring Suitcases filled with exciting treasures to explore
A suitcase makes a powerful provocation for any child. What could be in my Magic Suitcase today? Fill it with props for a story, small world creation or items that match the theme or topic that you are learning.
How to make corking Cork Characters!
Awwww…we loved making a whole host of these Recycled Cork Characters! From The 3 Little Pigs and Aliens Love Underpants to Superheroes, Farm animals, Princesses, Butterflies, Bees and a full set of Nativity Cork Characters! It is fair to say we got a little carried away making these!
9 Halloween Craft Projects for Kids
My boys love Halloween and it is a great opportunity to keep them busy with craft projects.
Here are our favourite 9 craft projects for kids.
Frozen Yogurt and Fruit Lollies
These Frozen yogurt and fruit lollies are a healthy, tasty treat and are ideal for the summer months and a great quick and easy make for little ones.
Clay Dragon Eyes
These air dry clay Dragon eyes are simple to make and engage boys and girls for a good hour or more. These would make a fab whole class project or would be a great activity at Beavers, Cubs or Scouts.
Pirate play in the Tuff Tray
My boys LOVE pirates, and the Tuff Tray is the perfect place to set up some great small world scenes and activities to explore.
Below we show 7 of our favourite activities: Digging for treasure, Pirate Sensory Bags, Pirate treasure maps, making potions or Pirate Grog, Playmobil setups and boat making and racing!
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