Arts and Crafts for 2 Yr Old

My 2 yr old loves to waterpaint, well pain period. She will sit at the table for hours painting if I let her. It all washes off, so I don't care how messy she gets.
www.everythingpreschool.com
www.preschoolexpress.com
are 2 sites I use as a daycare provider.
Good Luck!

My sister is queen of arts and crafts and recently sent me an email of a couple that I have posted to my computer right now that I would love to share with you.

Kool Aid Clay:
1 cup flour
1/2 cup salt
1 pkg unsweetened kool aid
3 tlbs oil
1 cup boiling water
Mix flour salt and kool aid then add water and oil and kneed until soft. ********dont eat*****

Edible Finger paint:
need: light corn syurp
food coloring and paper plates
pour 1 tlbs corn syurp on each plate
squirt food coloring into corn syurp puddle and mix with fingers. If they put it in there mouth it is ok you can eat it.

Applesauce Cinnamon Dough
1 cup applesauce
1 cup cinnamon
Mix the applesauce and cinnamon together until it gets to be a nice clay consistency. If it is too stickyadd either ingredient to even it out. You will have to play around with it. You can make shapes and designs and can use cookie cutters. Put cut outs in a warm dry place for a couple of days.
You may want to add a 1/2 cup of elemers glue to it so they stay together. *****do not eat***

Flubber:
Mixture 1 Mixture 2:
3/4 cup warm water 2 tsp borax
1 cup elemers glue 1/2 cup warm water
Food coloring

Stir mixture 1 and mixture 2 seperately, then after they have been mixed, pour in one bowl and begin to play.
*******do not eat*********

Oven Flour Clay
2 cups flour 1 cup salt
2 tlbs veg oil 1 3/4 cup water
Mix flour and salt and then add oil and then slowly add water and stir until you get a nice consistency. Once completely mixed make into desired shapes and bake at 250 for i hour depending on thickness and oven. Note making them too thick will make the shapes crack in the oven.***dont eat***
Good luck and have fun

I was the story lady at our local library for a year and every tuesday had to come up with a craft project to go with a story. I kept them simple as most of the little ones were 3 and under.

Get an empty egg carton, a pkg of those soft fuzzy craft balls, and some pipe cleaners. I gave each child a half of the egg carton. They made a six-pack of bugs. We read ladybug birthday that day..

Give him some graham crackers and frosting and a few m&m or other colorful candies and let him use the frosting for glue and he can create a "gingerbread" house. String licorice can be used to outline windows or doors. We did a short version of hanzel and gretel..

Finger painting can be done with pudding on a piece of butcher paper... they sometimes get very creative and use it to create new hairstyles too <G>

Help them cover a shoe box with foil paper and use stickers to decorate their very own treasure box. I like the "hinged" boxes for this one. Have a few hugs and kisses (the chocolate kind) they can drop in there for gold and silver. I made up a Peter Pan story with just the pirates going to their special secret island to recover their treasure..

Trace their hand, cut out and add those google eyes to the palm for eyes, and a fuzzzy craft ball for a nose, draw on a mouth and you have a reindeer for the tree... read rudolf

Pick up some wooden unfinished ornaments and have them color, before they start use a permanent ink and put the date on the back.. we have some from each year.. read Charlie Brown Christmas

Craft sticks glued to the edges of a photo or other type picture to create a frame makes a wonderful gift for grandma.. stickers to decorate, no story suggestion but there are several out there that deal with gift giving... or you might tell them a personal story about a Christmas when you were a little girl (in the olden days <g>)

Bake some cookies, before you put them in the oven use a straw to make a hole in one edge, after they cool have your littel artist decorate them with frosting, use a piece of shoestring licorice to hang them...

If you are overwhelmed by crayone drawings and the refrigerator door is too small for the entire art gallery, I use a length of hemp twine (can be colored twine) attach teh line to the wall with oversized push pins, and a pkg of those little clothespins (craft section) just hang the pics on the twine like an oldtime clothes line,

Use a paper cutter and make thin strips (about 1/2 inch) then cut them into odd sizes of rectangles (cut them over a bowl or shoe box) give the child a regular piece of construction paper and let them create a mosaic (use glue stick)

There is always the macaroni picture creations as well, or get the longer tubular type pasta (they can be colored with markers) and give some pieces of twine for stringing, a shoe lace will work if the pieces of pasta aren't too long

Hope there was something here you could use

My daughter is in the same boat, will eat anything still. Fingerpaint is the best bet! It is non-toxic and she usually is so intrigued by the slimey feeling and spreading the colors she doesn't eat it. It does get messy, though! I pin an old shirt on her, roll up her sleeves, pin her hair back, cover the table and then let her go!

I haven't tried the edible, homemade finger paint another mom gave you, but it sounded like a great idea!

I would stay away from beads, flubber and non-edible playdoh because most likely he'll swallow those right up, too and they definitely aren't non-toxic

:) Good Luck

Just saw at Michaels today they had Playdough for $1. Near the register in the wire black baskets...they also had bead art stuff, modeling clay and a bunch of other stuff. Try those and if he doesnt like it or eats it :), it was only a dollar...but you can also save it for a later date.
Also, now that its Christmas you can make a wreath from his handprints. Trace his hands and cut out about twenty of them (or depending how big you want it) and tape or glue them together until you get a nice circle, add a red bow and boom you've got a wreath...that he made with his cute little hands.

My soon to be 2 year old loves those foam stickers from Michaels, with their ad from Sunday’s paper you can save money plus they are normally priced between $5-$7. They usually have holiday ones with craft ideas. We made hand turkeys at Thanksgiving time. or Christmas she helped me make a construction paper garland. She loved to tape each one together. It’s the little things she enjoys, making something out of a toilet paper tube or egg carton. Too bad about the eating of the crayons and markers. My daughter loves to color and finger paint. Try play dough or clay too, my daughter can’t get enough of that stuff.

my kids always loved (still do) to play with shaving cream. I would buy the cheap mens shaving cream and put a bunch of it on the table and they could draw pictures in it with their fingers or put it on as beards (just watch so it doesn't get in the eyes or mouth. Finger painting was another favorite, just make sure to wear an old shirt so it doesn't ruin his. my kids also loved to make paper pirate hats and play with them. we would go to a store and ask if they had any large (fridge size or something simalar) boxes they didn't want and cut them up and color them for the castle or the boats and they would play for hours in them. take smaller boxes or even cereal boxes and make the sword and shield out of and take stuff animals as the enemies.

Yep, the foam stickers are great. My 2yr daughter and 4yr son love them. The paper makes a mess, but we have a little basket for them to put it in.