• Crafting as a family provides togetherness and creative activity.two female kids painting picture with chalk image by fotosergio from Fotolia.com
  
  Arts and crafts with kids can range in simplicity and price from fast, simple and free to complex with pricey supplies. However, the most important parts of crafting with kids are making it fun, memorable and a time for family togetherness. Parents can choose from a wide variety of crafts that can be worn or are educational, holiday themed, part of play time or involve nature.
  
  

Clothing and Accessories

• Tie-dyed t-shirts make lasting wearable memories.tie-dyed shirts image by Jim Parkin from Fotolia.com
  
  Clothing and accessories crafts are useful because the effort spent to create them can be lasting and easily displayed. Paint canvas sneakers, puff paint or tie-dye t-shirts, add applique to shirts and onesies or create straight stitch blankets for crafts that will get some use. Older kids might enjoy knitted or crocheted crafts such as small blankets or hats, bead or string necklaces and bracelets, accessorized headbands, stenciled umbrellas and jewels or stamps added to bags, purses and hats.
  
  

Educational Crafts

• Drawing and painting crafts and simple and inexpensive.crayons image by CraterValley Photo from Fotolia.com
  
  Educational crafts are ideal if a parent wishes to teach children a particular lesson. The project should be specific to the lesson at hand. Use paint or crayons to draw different seasons and weather conditions. Decorate foam letters and numbers with washable paint for bath-time play. Create science experiments for lessons about the Solar System, volcanoes or plants. Build dioramas from old shoe boxes featuring 3-D scenes on any school topic. Use recycled magazines to make collages that show the relationships between objects, people or colors. Make musical instruments from household objects like paper plates, toilet paper or paper towel rolls, strings and bottle caps. Use piggy banks to teach the principles of money. Make homemade word magnets and compose poetry on a refrigerator or whiteboard for lessons on spelling or grammar.
  
  

Holiday Ideas

• Cut hearts from paper for an easy Valentine's Day craft.paper hearts image by Randy McKown from Fotolia.com
  
  Make homemade cards or gifts for any holiday. Use paper to make snowflakes, leaves, hearts, shamrocks, piñatas, Independence Day lanterns, Christmas trees, Hanukkah menorahs, New Year's streamers, presidential silhouettes, flags or handprint turkeys. Make door wreaths, carve pumpkins, or decorate eggs and cookies for crafts in keeping with holiday traditions. Holiday-themed stamps, stencils, stickers and craft kits are readily available from craft and department stores.
  
  

Toys

• Fabric animals and dolls can be simple or complex sewing crafts.Brown bear doll image by Lucid_Exposure from Fotolia.com
  
  Another functional craft choice is to make homemade toys. Paper bag puppets are simple to make and can be used for puppet shows. Make other types of puppets from popsicle sticks, socks, pipe cleaners or felt. Build rockets from cardboard, soda bottles and toilet paper and paper towel rolls, or make airplanes and boats of paper or crafting foam. Papier-mâché may be time consuming to make, but can be used to make any object. Make dolls from fabric, socks, yarn, paper, sticks, pipe cleaners or wood. Create flip books from paper, felt or fabric.
  
  

Nature Activities

• Painted rocks are easy for parents and kids to make.easter painted egg image by Sergey Galushko from Fotolia.com
  
  Take kids out in nature for an opportunity to craft using the world around them. Make mosaics from small objects like beans, shells or seeds. Tie branches and twigs together to make mobiles and dolls. Even young children can paint rocks or save pressed leaves and flowers in a scrapbook. Trace leaves and other textures from nature on thin paper. Teach children about butterfly and bug species by having them create collections. Use pine cones as a starting point to make sculptures of a variety of animals, such as porcupines, hedgehogs, mice, cats and dogs. Taking pencils or pens outside to sketch nature for a relaxing art activity. Use flowers and grass to make garlands, crowns and dolls. Terrariums can be complex, but the whole family can get involved over a period of time.