Garden Crafts for Kids! Creative Projects Using Items from the Garden
Garden Crafts for Kids: Creative Projects Using Items from the Garden
Creating garden crafts for kids is a great way to get them off screens and out of the house once the school year begins. The fall garden and yard offer tons of free, natural materials for creating simple hands-on projects. From colorful leaves and dried flowers, seed heads to twigs, grasses to gourds, there’s a garden-made craft possible every weekend.
Start the project as a “treasure hunt.” Give your child a basket for gathering a variety of natural materials outdoors. Set parameters to harvest responsibly. Choose plants that are safe to handle, avoid anything treated with pesticides or other chemicals, and take only what you need. Fallen leaves, twigs, and pine cones are especially good choices because they can be collected without cutting or damaging living plants.
Let’s see what we can make!
Make a Leaf Collage
A leaf collage is one of the easiest “starter” garden crafts for preschoolers and younger children. Older kids can take the idea further by creating detailed pictures, patterns, or scenes from pressed leaves.
Gather leaves in different shapes, sizes, and colors. Children can glue them onto paper to create animals, faces, landscapes, or abstract designs. A small leaf might become a bird's wing, while a large maple leaf could turn into a turkey.
For a longer-lasting project, press the leaves first. Place them between sheets of paper inside a heavy book for several days until they are flat and dry. Pressed leaves can also be used to decorate homemade cards, bookmarks, or gift tags.
Create a Seed Head Bouquet
Don't overlook the garden after flowers are done blooming for the season. Dried flowers and seed heads can be just as interesting as summer blooms. In fact, dried bouquets really are in fashion these days!
Depending on what's growing in your garden, gather dried coneflower heads, ornamental grasses, yarrow, sedum, or other plants that have gone to seed. Let children choose several different shapes and textures and arrange them in a small vase, jar, or container.
Leave plenty of seed heads standing in the garden, too. They provide food for birds and can offer valuable habitat for beneficial insects through the winter.
Turn Pumpkins and Gourds into Garden Characters
Pumpkins, gourds, and winter squash are perfect for creative garden crafts in the fall months. Instead of carving every pumpkin into a jack-o'-lantern, invite kids to turn them into whimsical garden characters.
Use leaves, dried flowers, grasses, seed heads, and small twigs to create hair, hats, ears, noses, wings, and other features. A collection of small gourds can become a family of garden creatures.
For a temporary outdoor project, tuck natural materials into place or attach lightweight pieces with craft glue. If you use paint or other decorations, protect your crafts somewhere protected from rain so they last longer.
Make a Nature Wreath
A nature wreath is one of the more creative projects that use natural materials. It gives kids the chance to gather and arrange an assortment of gifts from the garden while experimenting with color, texture, and shape.
Start with a purchased grapevine wreath form, or make a simple circle from flexible fallen twigs and branches. Then gather dried flowers, grasses, herbs, seed heads, leaves, pinecones, and pods—anything that catches a child’s eye and imagination! Tuck the materials into the wreath and layer different textures as you go. An adult can help secure anything that needs additional support with floral wire or twine.
Use the wreath to decorate a door or shed, or display it indoors. Be sure to keep these soon-to-be dried natural materials clear of candles!
Make Herb Sachets
If you've grown herbs that are ready to harvest in early fall, turn some of them into fragrant sachets. Lavender, rosemary, sage, and thyme can all be dried and used for this simple craft.
Fill small drawstring bags with dried herbs and let kids decorate the outside with fabric markers or other craft materials. The finished sachets can be placed in drawers or closets or given as homemade gifts.
This project is also an opportunity to show children that the garden can provide something other than food. Herbs can be used in the kitchen, yes—but they also offer fragrance, texture, and useful materials for crafts.
Create a Twig and Pinecone Craft
Fallen twigs and pinecones are ideal for any sort of natural craft because there is no single right way to use them. Depending on their age and imagination, children can make simple ornaments, miniature animals, fairy houses, or woodland scenes—even food for the birds!
Collect twigs of different lengths along with pinecones, seed pods, and other fallen materials. Arrange everything on a flat surface and experiment with different designs before attaching the pieces. See what craft is calling to you.
A quick pinecone craft is as simple as tying a long piece of twine to the bottom end of a pinecone, smearing it with all-natural peanut butter, rolling and pressing it in birdseed, then hanging from a nearby tree. Get your ID book ready for when the birds come!
Try a Cyanotype with Garden Plants
For a garden craft that feels a little more like magic, try making cyanotypes using materials from the garden. A cyanotype is a photographic printing process that uses light-sensitive paper to create distinctive blue-and-white images.
This project is especially appealing to older children, and younger kids can participate with adult supervision. Simply collect flat leaves, delicate flowers, grasses, or small fern fronds and arrange them on cyanotype-ready paper. Follow the instructions that come with your cyanotype paper for exposing it to light and developing the print by running it under water. With adult supervision, you can splash the print with hydrogen peroxide (that you get at the drug store) to quickly bring out the blue!
Before Pic from Katie Elzer-Peters
The images that emerge are beautiful! Frame them as botanical artwork, turn them into cards, or use as decorations. Encourage children to experiment with different plant shapes and arrangements to see how each one creates a different silhouette.
After Pic from Katie Elzer-Peters
Cyanotype kits and pre-treated paper make the process much easier for beginners. You can find cyanotype kits for children at a science or toy store such as Bella Luna Toys.
Let the Garden Inspire the Craft
The best garden crafts for kids don't always begin with a set of instructions. Sometimes it's better to give children a basket and let them explore what the garden offers in fall.
The finished project may be a leaf collage, a gourd creature, or something entirely unexpected. That's part of the appeal of garden crafts for kids. These simple activities give children a reason to spend time outdoors, look more closely at the natural world, and discover that the garden has plenty of creative possibilities even as the growing season winds down.
