6 Creative Garden Crafts Your Kids Will Love!

Looking for fun and easy garden crafts for kids? Kids of all ages can enjoy making gifts and doing activities that center around a garden theme. These inexpensive ideas are a creative way to bring the fun of gardening inside.

Have you ever had a chia pet? It’s easy to make and grow your own “chia” or grass pet! Within a week, you will have sprouting “hair” on your pet. As it grows, you can give it a haircut.

• Nylon stocking
• Potting soil
• Grass seed 
• Plastic container
• Googly eyes
• Pipe cleaners
• Glue
• Waterproof markers
• Water

1. Cut a piece of nylon stocking, including the toe.
2. Place grass seed into the stocking.
3. Fill with potting soil.
4. Tie shut or use pipe cleaners.
5. Glue googly eyes on and draw a mouth with waterproof markers
6. Use pipe cleaners to make sections for a caterpillar or another animal.
7. Pour water into the bottom of the container.
8. Place the grass pet in the container making sure it can soak up the water.
9. Keep it watered daily and watch your pet grow “fur”!

Kids can gather leaves and flowers from your garden to make a beautiful piece of artwork. Even toddlers will be entertained by this simple project.

• Playdough or salt dough
• Cookie cutters
• Leaves
• Flowers
• Sticks

1. Roll out and cut dough into shapes.
2. Press flowers, leaves, and sticks into the dough. You can leave them there and let the dough dry or remove them and leave the impression.
3. Make a small hole in the dough while still wet if you would like to make it into an ornament. Once dry, you can slip a ribbon or twine through the hole to hang it.

For a homemade version that can dry well, use this recipe:

• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/4 cup salt
• 1/2 cup water

1. Mix the flour and salt.
2. Slowly add water while kneading it together until it makes a dough that can be molded.
3. To dry quickly, place dough in the oven at 300 degrees for about 30 minutes or until dry. (Drying time depends on the thickness of the dough.)

Who says you have to go to the store for beautiful wrapping paper or cards? Instead, create your own stamps with potatoes and let your creative kids get to work making beautiful paper.

• Potatoes cut in half
• Kitchen knife
• Pencil
• Cookie cutters
• Paint
• Paper

1. Cookie-cutter method: Push cookie cutter into a potato and then carefully cut away the potato around it. You will have a raised section in the shape of the cookie cutter.
2. Pencil method: Draw a shape into a potato. Cut around the outline, leaving raised area for stamping. Apply paint with a brush or dip potato into the paint on a paper plate. Press potato stamp onto paper. Use long sheets of rolled paper to make wrapping paper. Use heavy craft paper to make cards.

Pressed flowers have been used for ages to preserve garden blooms because it’s so fun and easy to do. Kids of any age can learn to press flowers and create beautiful gifts to share.

• Flowers and leaves (flatter flowers work best, or take off petals). Try Morning Glory, Nasturtium, Poppies, or Cosmos.
• Heavy book
• A heavy object (dumbbells or garden brick)
• Absorbent paper
• Craft Paper
• A picture frame for an art collage, sticky contact paper, or packing tape for a bookmark.

1. Pace flowers between two sheets of absorbent paper.
2. Place paper and flowers between pages of a heavy book or in a book with a heavy object on top. 
3. Check flowers after a few days. When they are dry, place flowers on craft paper. Frame your artwork, or roll a strip of packing tape or contact paper over the flowers to make a bookmark.

Note: The oils and liquids from the plants will soak through. Don’t use books that you care about getting soiled. You can use sketchbooks and shut them tight with rubber bands, and place a heavy brick on top.

Other fun things to do with pressed flowers: Make a border around photos in glass frames. Apply to school notebooks. Make sun catchers by using only contact paper or clear packing tape over the flowers for a see-through effect.

Do your own recycling and turn paper into a surprising craft that will grow in the garden. Seed paper is a fun way to show how paper can be recycled while creating a gift to share.

• Seeds (grass seed, wildflowers, poppies, etc.)
• Paper
• Water
• Blender
• Fine mesh strainer or cheesecloth

1. Tear paper into small pieces. Cover with water and let sit overnight.
2. Place paper mixture in blender and blend up paper until smooth.
3. Stir in seeds with a spoon.
4. Strain through cheesecloth or strainer.
5. Pour pulp onto a flat surface and press out the excess water.
6. While the pulp is wet, you can press it into simple shapes.
7. Let seed pulp dry completely.

Plantable seed paper can be given as a gift with instructions on how to plant it.

To plant seed paper, place it on top of soil. Lightly cover with soil. Water and keep moist. Watch for seeds to sprout and continue watering as needed.

• Leaves
• Flowers
• Vegetables

1. Take a leaf from each plant in your garden, along with its matching flower or vegetable.
2. Place leaves on one side of the table and flowers/vegetables on the other.
3. See if you can identify which is a match. No peaking outside!
4. For a year-round game, take close-up pictures of leaves and flowers. Print pictures and make them into cards. Use the picture cards to play a garden-matching game all winter long.