Today we are crafting and decorating with empty toilet paper tubes. Toilet rolls, according to me claim the #1 spot in the list of upcyclables. Arts and crafts projects for kids will never be the same with out them. This craft was supposed to be a Thanksgiving craft – Thanksgiving tree actually. We intended to create a tree with empty toilet rolls but what we have right now are beautiful shimmering individual paper tubes.

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• Empty Toilet rolls
• Contact Paper
• Glitter
• Collage materials
• Beads, button, feathers(anything really)
• Glue (optional)

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We used the already painted tree trunks paper tubes from our apple tree project.

Instead of setting out glue and collage materials, I covered the toilet rolls with contact paper. Contact Paper is a wonderful material for kids projects when the plain side is glued down and the sticky side is left up for the kids to explore. It is called “protector sheet” and is available in clear at many teacher supply stores, crafts stores and occasionally at chain stores. Check out Deb’s post on Learn with play at home to learn how you can use contact paper in play.

Today I wrapped the paper rolls with contact paper and stuck either ends with each other. I set them out along with some fun collage materials for the kids to come over and check out the invitation table. Collage materials selections should clearly be kid-specific. From simply tissue paper to materials from nature it is all up to the kid’s interests.

This is the first time we are using contact paper and I should say the girls were psyched. They kept touching and exploring the paper rolls while squealing “It’s sticky, it’s sticky”. Kudos to sensory exploration.

Once the initial excitement of contact paper settled down, creation started. They started sticking the beads, discs and buttons to the contact paper wrapped paper rolls. Big A on cue started sticking the beads in a pattern alternating the colors.

She also has apparently created a “rock wall” of some sort using beads.

The cut up pipe cleaners proved to be very popular since the girls used them as hair for their creations. Unfortunately they did not hold that well.

All the while, the girls were sharpening those fine motor skills while learning patterns. For Baby A the emphasis is on color recognition and labeling each material on the collage tray.

Here are our creations.

    The moment I mentioned glitter, the girls jumped at the chance. They sprinkled, poured, shook the glitter all over the contact paper covered paper tubes. It adhered really well and got the kids very excited about the process of sticking. A box of glitter, a pre shooler and a toddler. This screams supervision every nano second.

After the glitter galore, here’s how our toilet rolls looked. Pretty?

[box title=”Learning” color=”#333333″]

• Worked on fine motor skills
• Patterns
• Color Recognition
• Counting Skills
• Imagination)

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