For those who are new to the magazine, Wild Kids is a free monthly printable nature-based magazine that I publish as a nonprofit way to put some more good in the world. Each issue includes ways to learn and play in nature that month, foraging information, a weather tree to track the month’s weather, nature study pages and seasonal poems and activities. This year, I’m including vintage nature-themed cards each month, too (so far we’ve had butterfly fairies, birds and trees).
Miss Fiona and her daddy have a tradition this time of year of watching The Nutcracker and reading picture books about nutcrackers. Daryl also has a collection of nutcrackers that the kids love to play with.
Last week, Fiona asked me if she could spend her money on a nutcracker for daddy. The nutcracker in question was overpriced and badly made, so I offered to help her make him a nutcracker instead. She loved the idea and I was on the hunt for some fun and easy nutcracker crafts.
Here are the best that I found, in case your kiddos would like to make some nutcrackers of their own.
Sophie World has this easy printable nutcracker that kids color and then glue to a toilet paper tube. Add embellishments like buttons, feathers, pompoms and even a toothpick sword if you like. It’s a bit tricky to find the PDF — click on “stats” to find it.
Learn Create Love has a printable nutcracker that kids can color and then cut out and assemble.
Playground Park Bench has a rather elaborate Nutcracker and mouse battle tic tac toe game made of clothespins that you can make with the kids. I’m not sure we need to buy all the parts and do it that fancy, but I’m thinking we could use some clothespins and craft supplies around the house to make our own kid versions.
I’ve admired them over the years and always wanted to start one with the kids.
Weathertree.com offersthis one for sale from the UK each year…
And they also offer one that focuses on goals (weight loss, exercise completed, eggs laid by chickens and small business profits are some examples!) instead of weather…
Some people just color them with one or two colors for sunny or cloudy, while some color-code the leaves for hot, windy, rainy and so on. On some calendars, you can see people colored the leaves several colors to show changing weather or various elements of the day’s weather.
We’re going to do the weather (cloudy, rainy, snowy, sunny, etc.) for the main part of the leaf and outline the leaf to show temperature (hot, cold or mild). Of course, here in Minnesota I think anything above zero counts as mild these days. 🙂
Ours is printed and we’re filling in the first leaf tonight.
The book can be printed and used in a multitude of ways — you can cut it into strips to make a tiny book for your purse, cut it in half for a medium sized book, keep the pages intact for a binder, or cut each little square out to make little notes for the fridge and such to remember those quotes.
“Above all else, I want you to know that you are loved and lovable. You will learn this from my words and actions–the lessons on love are in how I treat you and how I treat myself…”
Here’s a lovely free printable for parents from Brene Brown, to help us remember the important things in this journey. Be sure to check out her lovely article about it in the Huffington Post too!
I’m not much of a journal keeper, but I think I could be if I got to use these delightful pages from Grace is Overrated.
Blog owner and artist Christie Zimmer says:
These pages were created out of a sense of delightful (and occasionally insightful) personal exploration. They combine fill-in-the-blank journal prompts with off-kilter to-do lists with game-show-inspired lightning rounds with whatever else comes to mind. I’ve had a great time creating them and I hope you’ll have just as much fun filling them in. Collect them all in a binder or envelope and look back every once in a while to see all that you’ve accomplished!
The pages are absolutely delightful and could be used by moms or kids (or anybody else!) alike. (Christie asks that her images not be reprinted elsewhere so you have to head over there to see the pages.)
Click on each page to view it and download it via Google docs. If you have trouble printing, check out her FAQ section for troubleshooting ideas.
A Magical Childhood 