A survival guide to everyday motherhood



About Me

My photo
I am a photography fanatic. I love taking pictures, tweaking pictures, and finding the beauty in every day items

Sunday, June 15, 2008

Hand Puppets

FAMILY MOMENT MONDAY
Do you have pieces of old fabric laying around your house? Maybe some old socks with no match? What about activity hungry kids that would love more one on one time with their parents?

What?! You do?

Well, then.... I've got a Family Moment Monday for you...... putting on a family show! I will give quick easy explanations and issue lists you will need for hand, sock, and stick puppets.

Hand Puppets
Fabric
Items for face features (buttons, beans, googly eyes, more fabric, permanent marker, puff balls, yarn for hair... really anything)
Paper & Pen for tracing
Scissors
Glue Gun
Needles & thread for sewing together if no sewing machine OR use fabric glue

First go through your house and find all the scraps of fabric that you can find. If you don't have any fabric... you can head over to Joann's and they sell pre-cut fabric of all kinds for a decent price, if you are just wanting to run in and grab a bunch of sheets. Have every one trace their hands, but make sure that all their fingers are pressed together EXCEPT the pinkie and thumb, have those sticking out for future arms.

Then use the hand tracing to cut the fabric out (the puppets body). Now everyone can spend time decorating their puppets with eyes, hair, ears, hooves, or whiskers. Once everyone is done then the bodies can be sewn together by hand, machine or glued together.

Sock Puppets
Socks
Fabric
Items for face features (buttons, beans, googly eyes, more fabric, permanent marker, puff balls, yarn for hair... really anything)
Scissors
Glue Gun
Marker

Place the sock on your hand, using your thumb and hand to make the mouth. Now with a marker, mark where you want the eyes, tongue, ears and so forth. You can now take the sock off and start gluing all the items on. Simple.... don't you just love that!? :)

Stick Puppets
Popsicle sticks
Markers, crayons, colored pencils
Glue
Paper

Get some images that can be colored in or have people draw their own pictures. You can even go online and find some fun cartoon people that you can print off and have them color. But... have every one draw/color/ cut out all their drawings. Once this is done then simply glue the images on the sticks.

So there you go.... three different ways to make puppets. This is a real fun activity because you can either spend a fun evening making puppets or you can have the kids spend their afternoon making puppets sweat-shop-style. (this is nice especially since kids are now home during these loooong summer days) . So, when dad gets home they can put a fun show on for the parents. You can have real fun with this by making puppets that look like each family member or of animals to tell a farm tale, biblical characters for a bible story, or fairy tale puppets for fun 3 little pig stories. There are endless possibilties, so have fun. :)

And rememeber... if you are participating in Family Moment Monday, then go ahead and add your URL to Mr. Linky here :)

24 comments:

  1. I love your ideas! My kids used to love to do this when they were younger. Your suggestions are simple enough that even the most uncrafty person could pull it off. (Course the kids don't care how clever it looks. They just want to put on the show, right,?)Thanks for the ideas.
    I posted a Family Moment Monday. Now that my kids are quite a bit older than yours (youngest is 11) we need to go for the more "adventurous" activities.

    ReplyDelete
  2. We have finger puppets, given as a gift, They are cute but sometimes the kid just throws them around so they wind up at Puppet hospital!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Oh I bet my daughter would love this! I have not thought about puppets in so long! :)

    ReplyDelete
  4. I. love. it.
    You, my friend, are so creative.
    If I send you all the materials needed... would you make them for me?
    I tease.
    I think you need your own Etsy shop.
    Now!

    ReplyDelete
  5. r u writing a book?? seriously. you know you should right? bc one day when i finally become that cool kinda crafty mama, i am going to want to remember all these!!

    ReplyDelete
  6. Yeah, all my babies love puppets. I bet Lucy is never bored in your house, geesh!

    Great idea~

    ReplyDelete
  7. My daughter made a pupet at preschool last week and is now in love with them! This is a fun idea!

    ReplyDelete
  8. We've been meaning to make something like this. I saw some similar for sale on Land of Nod - they have good ideas, too. I love collecting fabrics, but have poor follow through for labor intensive projects. These will be fun!

    ReplyDelete
  9. Seriously, you're killing me with you're creativity!!!

    BTW, you've been tagged! Check out my blog :)

    ReplyDelete
  10. Payten LOVES making sock puppets, we grab random things anything we can find around the house. LOVE ya.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Sock puppets I can do! Just have to wait for my kids to come home. Enjoy your week.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Well arent yo ua creative little lady! Crafty, Crafty, Crafty!

    ReplyDelete
  13. What a fun idea!
    I remember making potato head puppets when I was a kid. I loved it when they grew "eyes" all over their heads!

    ReplyDelete
  14. My children LOVE puppets! Great idea on the stick ones! I hadn't thought of that and will use it!

    ReplyDelete
  15. That is such a cute idea! My kids would love these!

    ReplyDelete
  16. I might be able to try this one. Socks are easy, or so I think.

    ReplyDelete
  17. I love puppets, they are so easy and fun. I could make an entire cast for a play with all of our random missing a mate socks.

    I have printed out coloring sheets of animals from google images and put them on popsicle sticks as well.

    great job! Ps.. can I get the monkey puppet, my 18 month old LOVES monkeys...

    ReplyDelete
  18. I don't know why, but I just love finger puppets!

    ReplyDelete
  19. Just stopped by to say, Nice Blog. I liked the name of your blog. I am a first timer bolgger so still struggling but will do it. Thanks

    Love to your kid

    ReplyDelete
  20. such a simple idea, that never crossed my mind and would be so much fun.

    ReplyDelete
  21. You are just full of wonderful ideas!

    ReplyDelete
  22. Hand puppets are perfect puppet that can be handle by hand easily and sock puppets are very popular and information you shared is good.
    ventriloquist puppets for sale

    http://www.marionettes-puppets.com/Ventriloquist-dolls.html

    ReplyDelete