AD | A few weeks ago, the girls and I were invited to an online virtual crafting session hosted by Viking. They invited us to join in with a few other families on a Saturday morning. I accepted – anything to help keep the kids busy when they are bored at home. It was around week 523 of lockdown and I was all out of inspirational fun family time together and in desperate need of a reminder of lockdown silver linings! They were going to send us all the crafting supplies, and on the day we were going to be taught how to make 3 easy crafts for kids at home, all with the stuff they sent us.
Initially, I wasn’t sure what to make of it (get it). I always thought Viking was only about office supplies and furniture. I’m all for crafting and upcycling, but I wasn’t sure how much help the kids would be with making an office chair. Thank goodness this wasn’t that!
Disclaimer: This is a sponsored post. We were sent all the crafting and cleaning products and gifted the online craft lesson in return for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
Cleaning And Crafting Supplies from Viking
The lovely people at Viking sent us over a massive box of crafting and cleaning supplies. I couldn’t believe how much they sent over! They thought of everything from packs of loo rolls to packaging tape, cleaning supplies to chocolate and hand sanitiser!
I am also very grateful that they included a note in the emails asking us, very kindly, NOT to eat the chocolate ahead of the day. I did have to hide it from my husband though!
On the day we were all set up in the kitchen, with lots of excited (arguing) chatter from the girls, and my bonus-daughter was there to lend a hand too. We weren’t sure exactly what to expect so I had roped her in because of maths: 1 x mum vs 2 x excited children. Also, I was worried I wouldn’t be able to keep up. We’d had a couple of rather stressful virtual art lessons earlier on in lockdown – I was hoping this wasn’t going to be that.
When we joined the Zoom call, it was so lovely to see all the other families and excited kids pop up on our screen. The fabulous Jane from Tea and Crafting led the online crafting lesson. After a brief explanation and run through the order of events, we got cracking. 3 easy crafts for kids at home coming up!
3 Easy Crafts For Kids At Home with Viking
Bubble Wrap Chocolate
Our first craft was ultimately the girls’ favourite. I’m not going to lie, mine too. An easy craft for kids using chocolate and bubble wrap! A recipe for success, and it was.
This has to be the easiest craft to do at home with kids and the yummiest. The hardest part was waiting for it to set before we could peel and eat. Here’s how to make bubble wrap chocolate.
Ingredients & materials for Bubble Wrap Chocolate
- Washing up soap & water
- Hand Sanitiser (Wash your hands … sanitise)
- Aero chocolate bars (about 3 singles bars)
- Bubble Wrap (roughly an A4 size)
- Plate
- Microwaveable Mixing bowl
- Spoon
Method for Bubble Wrap Chocolate
- Wash your hands and work surface thoroughly before starting.
- Cut a piece of bubble wrap, roughly to A4 size, and clean it using simple washing up soap and water. Dry it.
- Crumble about 3-4 chocolate bars into a small bowl using your fingers. Aero chocolate works well because the bubbles in it make it easy to squash.
- Rewash your hands to clean away all the chocolate bits left on them.
- Put the bowl of crumbled chocolate in the microwave and heat for 30 seconds. Take it out and stir it. Keep doing this at 30-second blasts so you can evenly distribute the heat and help it melt quicker.
- Place the dry A4 piece of bubble wrap on a (flat) plate.
- Being careful not to burn your hands on the hot bowl, pour the melted chocolate onto the bubble wrap and then spread it over evenly with a spatula or the back of a spoon, making sure it’s not too thinly spread.
- Pop it into the fridge for about 30 minutes to set.
- Clean your work surface up and rewash your hands.
- After it has set, peel back the bubble wrap from the chocolate and be amazed! The peeling back of the bubble wrap is incredibly satisfying. See for yourself in the video I posted on the day:
My girls loved the bubble wrap effect on the chocolate so much that they used the same technique to decorate their sister’s birthday cake later that week. I think it turned out amazing and it’s such a quick and easy craft for kids to make, that they can eat too.
Pin this post now to remember to try it at home later.
Fire Breathing Dragon Craft
The second craft was How To Make a Fire Breathing Dragon using an empty toilet roll and some tissue paper. These were fun, and you can customise them endlessly.
- Clean your working area and wash your hands or use some hand sanitiser before starting.
- Take a sheet of A4 paper. Measure how long your toilet roll tube is and then cut a strip of paper along the long side of the A4 using that measurement.
- Spread glue over your toilet roll holder and then glue your paper to the toilet roll tube and cut where the paper overlaps. Trim off any edges that overhang the opening if needed.
- Add eyes and a nose to your dragon’s body, do this by using a Sharpie to draw the eyes and then draw a little square under your eye. This square will fold back and be glued down so that the dragon eyes stay upright. Do the same for the nose and glue the eyes and nose down.
- Cut tissue paper into strips no longer than about 10cm in length and about a finger’s width. Glue the strips to the top (this would be where the dragon eyes and nose are placed) and bottom of the inside of the toilet roll tube. There’s no need to add tissue paper to the sides of the toilet roll; at this point, it’s okay if the tissue paper overlaps.
- Hold your dragon at an angle in front of you and breathe into the toilet roll tube – you’ll see its tissue paper fire breath come to life!
How To Make Parcel Tape Feet
The third of our 3 easy crafts for kids at home was the Parcel Tape Feet. It’s exactly how it sounds. You make two feet shapes from tracing your child’s feet and cutting out the form. Then you tape them to straws which you also tape into the roll of parcel tape, and as you roll the roll of tape, it looks like the feet are walking. Parcel tape feet is a really quick and easy craft for the kids to do at home. Here are the instructions in more detail:
Make sure to clean your working area and wash your hands before starting on this activity.
- Cut a straw in half and tape it to the inside of the parcel tape roll making sure the straws stick out of the edge of the tape on opposite sides (i.e. left and right). Also, make sure that they are placed on opposite ends (i.e. top and bottom) inside the parcel tape roll. Take a look at the image to help you place the straws. You only need a finger’s width of straw coming out of the tube so trim off any excess.
- Remove the cotton wool from the cotton buds on both ends. If you’re using a kebab stick, there’s no need to trim at all.
- Take a sheet of A4 paper and fold in half. Then trace around your child’s foot or get siblings to help each other to do this. Cut two little feet out of the paper.
- Place your feet (ensuring it’s a left and right foot side by side) and tape the cotton bud to the inside of each foot.
- Slot the cotton buds into the straw, roll the parcel tape and watch your feet walk!
Personally, we found that my 8-year-old daughter’s feet were a little large, and they kept flopping around instead of rolling nicely, so I reinforced the back of her cut out feet shapes by sticking another half a straw each lengthways. It worked a treat – no more flopping.
If you’re interested, here is another review of the Viking Virtual Craft Event by Viking themselves.
And there you have it—3 easy crafts for kids at home. I know with the long summer holidays looming ahead of us, never mind the past 15 weeks of being stuck at home we’re always looking for new, fun and exciting crafts to do at home for kids.
Pin For Later
I am by no means a crafty mom, so if you have any suggestions of crafts to do at home with kids, please let me know in the comments below. With the long summer holidays stretching out ahead of us, after the past 15 weeks of lockdown, I am just about out of ideas of ways to entertain the kids.
Disclaimer: This is a sponsored post. We were sent all the crafting and cleaning products and gifted the online craft lesson in return for an honest review.
Kudos to the folks at Viking! We used to have them in the States (not sure if they still function here) and I used to LOVE getting office supplies from them, back in the day! I LOVE that they will send you all the supplies they need, right down to the chocolate bars, and that their ideas were actually original and clever. Super-impressed; love this company even more, now.
You’re such a good mom, these activities look amazing!
Such great tips during this time when many kids have been home for so long.
It’s been so long. Hopefully you find something to help fill the time. ?
Very interesting tips at this pandemic time when kids are stuck at home.
All these are amazing fun activities to do with the kids.
Wow! These easy crafts for Kids are amazing ideas and fun activities for Kids at Home to encourage their creativity and promote mental growth.
Nice idea to keep kids engage in this period.
Nice idea to keep kids engaging in this period.
I’m sharing this with my daughter-in-law even though my grandson is just turning 2 – she likes to plan ahead and will LOVE these ideas. How great that the Viking company was so generous and organized!