Easy Christmas Craft for Little Hands: Paper Plate Wreath

I saw this craft on Pinterest last Christmas, but never had the appropriate paper plates in the house to do it. On one of my (many) trips to the dollar store this month, I picked up a pack of paper plates - 36 - for $1. That's about right.

 

This craft works best if you're using the really super flimsy, thin paper plates.

 

Before the kids started to paint, I stuck a few pieces of tape on the bottom of the plates so that they wouldn't move around and fall off the table while the kids were painting. Our kids can be a bit... vigorous with paint brushes.

Even 1.5 year old Anneke got in on the action, though she painted herself more than the plate.

Hendrik kept getting very focused on the centre of the plate. Now, the thing is, with this craft you don't even need to paint the middle of the plate - you're going to cut it out. However, I just had the kids paint the whole thing to minimize mess. They like painting, anyhow, so they might as well paint the whole plate, right?

When the plates have been painted and the paint has dried, gently bend the plate in half and make a cut with scissors.  Unfold the plate, and cut out the centre of the plate so that you have a wreath shape.

Older kids will be able to do all of the decorating by themselves, but I helped Hendrik out by putting white glue where he should put the decorations. I have a 1" circle punch and used it to punch a bunch of red circles out of scrap red paper. That punch is the most used craft supply of mine this year. I'd highly recommend using the Micheal's 50% off coupon to buy one next time the flyer comes out.

You can hang the wreath by punching a hole in the top & threading some dental floss or fishing line through, or simply by putting double sided tape on the back and sticking it up on a door. I have a feeling we're going to have a bunch of these decorating our house this year!

Hendrik has been learning this song as we make our wreaths - sung to the tune of "Puff the Magic Dragon" (which happens to be one of his favourite songs right now).