Holiday Craft – Faux Stained Glass

1 year old, 2 year old, Uncategorized, , , ,
I don’t normally do “crafts” with L, as they usually involve more work by the adult than by the child.  However, this is one craft that has several steps the child can do by herself, and really only requires that the preparation of the materials is done by the adult.  I’ve been doing this faux stained glass craft for several years in my classrooms, and I’ve also seen it on Pinterest.  Since it’s December, I decided to make them in the shape of Christmas ornaments, although they can be done in any shape you want.  This is a great sensorial experience as the child feels the stickiness of the glue and hears the crunching of the tissue paper.  It also works on the gross motor skills involved in painting a large object and the fine motor skills needed to pick up thin pieces of tissue paper and place them on the shape.

I began by tracing a bowl on a piece of wax paper.  L loves to repeat things, so I traced the bowl four times since I knew she would never be satisfied with just one.  I painted with glue around the outline of the ornament and told L to paint inside.  When she finished painting one circle, I gave her a bowl of tissue paper squares and showed her how to put them on the wet glue.  She thought it was really funny when the tissue paper pieces stuck to her fingers.  When she finished one circle, we moved on to the next until all four were covered in glue and tissue paper.

 

 

 

 

L left the table and I painted the ornaments with another layer of glue on top of the tissue paper.  I did this myself because the tissue paper is very fragile and would get all scrunched up and torn with the rough movements of a toddler.  Then I put a construction paper “frame” on top — simply the same bowl traced on construction paper and cut out.  When the ornaments were dry I cut them out of the wax paper. Finally, I drew a hook on some construction paper and added it to the top of each ornament.  I hung them up in the window so the light could shine through like a stained glass window.  This was an easy holiday project that we can keep up all month, and L loved making them!