Simple Spring Flower Craft

The flowers have started blooming in our backyard and I've even attempted to keep a few plants alive in our house over the past few weeks. My indoor plants didn't last long, so we decided to make some fake flowers out of muffin tin liners to cheer me up.

Last year we made these pretty spring flowers as part of our Spring Party for preschoolers. This year I'm living day to day with the arrival of baby #4 so we're skipping the spring party this year and just having fun afternoon art time together as a family.

If you haven't made muffin tin liner flowers before our secret weapon with this activity is SPARKLES. Lots of them.

Anything that is teeny tiny is also usually a hit with my little people. They love glitter, glitter glue, buttons, sequins, jewels, etc. Pretty much every kid I've ever made these with has been obsessed with the sparkly objects.

When we made these last year I thought it was cool how the kids layered the different sizes of muffin tin liners to make different types of flowers.

This activity is pretty open ended. We talked about making flowers, using muffin tin liners, and drawing stems, but other than that I just let the kids go and explore the materials.

MATERIALS NEEDED:

muffin tin liners (varied sizes)
sequins
other embellishments (buttons, pieces of ribbon, jewels, etc.)
white glue
markers
cardstock

I did this activity with my three oldest kids, ages 3, 5, and 8.

Afternoon art time at our house is relaxing, messy, and a great time to connect with one another. It is a judgement free zone. I typically try and create alongside my kids and we all enjoy being together.

As we create I try my best to comment on what the kids are creating without saying "wow, that's good" or "so pretty" and passing judgement. I try and talk about more about lines and colors and shapes they are creating and stuff they are doing in their art.

Often we just create in silence alongside one another too. Our favorite preschool teacher always reminds us to sit next to kids when they are creating (don't stand above them) and avoid using too much language. Kids often can't create as well when someone is talking to them too much and they need to multitask. Silence can extend creative periods.

TO MAKE SPRING FLOWERS:

The directions for making these is super easy. Draw some stems with markers, glue some muffin tin liners on as a flowers, put glue on muffin tin liners to add embellishments. Easy peasy!