3 Craft Ideas Your Whole Family Will Enjoy

Arts and crafts are a great way to get your children’s hands and minds working. There are many craft ideas out there to suit children at any age, that grow in complexity as they get older. Age specific crafts are a great way to spend some one-on-one time with each of your children, but it is always nice to find a craft idea that your whole family will enjoy. If there is a substantial age difference between your children, it can be difficult to find craft ideas that all age groups will take part in, and actually enjoy. Here are 3 craft ideas that will inspire some family fun Ottawa families can do together.

Paper Plate Ping-Pong

Who doesn’t enjoy a game of ping-pong? While having a ping-pong table is great for older children, it’s a little out of reach (figuratively and literally) to smaller children. Luckily, this craft can make the game accessible to everyone, while getting everyone together to make it. All you’ll need is:

  • Paper Plates
  • Popsicle Sticks
  • Glue
  • Balloons
  • Paint or Glitter (Optional)

All you need to do is glue a paper plate to a popsicle stick, inflate a balloon, and enjoy bopping it around the living room using your home-made paddles. You can allow your children to personalize their paddles with paint, and glitter to make it more interesting, but stay away from pointy, or sharp crafting supplies such as rhinestones or else your “ping-pong ball” won’t last very long!

Pebble Art

This craft is great for all ages, and gets everyone outdoors and exploring. The only supplies you’ll need to purchase are: poster board, glue and paint (optional) – the rest can be found right in your backyard.
Get the family outdoors to collect pebbles, twigs, and really whatever “art supplies” they’d like. Once they’ve collected their materials you can spend the afternoon gluing them to the poster board in order to create an all-natural art piece.

Younger children will most likely just enjoy sticking and pasting, but it is a great opportunity to get your older children’s creativity going. They can use the pebbles and twigs to create simplistic, yet more complex images that they will be proud to have created.

Outdoor Scrabble Board

Scrabble is the classic word-based game that helps children boost their vocabulary skills, in a fun, competitive environment. While the original game, and all its tiny pieces is not suited for younger children; the larger-scale, outdoor version is a safer way for your youngsters to enjoy the game.
The materials you’ll need are:

  • Pressboard
  • Alphabet Stencils
  • Craft Paint

Once you’ve cut the pressboard into squares, you can get your children to stencil on the letters, and colour them in with the craft paint. After that, you can bring your personalized Scrabble set outside to get your children spelling while allowing them to run around and have fun.

It can be hard to get older children playing with their younger siblings. These crafts are a great way to combine interests, and can be as simple or complex as each age group needs. (Not to mention they won’t cost a fortune!)  So, if you’re ready to have some crafty family fun, Ottawa parents should try out one or all of these great family craft ideas.