Camp Crafts for Kids to Make

I love throwback crafts during the summer, and making camp crafts at home or as part of a camping unit/summer camp at school is a great way to get kids engaged in some classic crafting.

The first thing I think of when I think of camp crafting is lanyards, and while I think of lanyards as being the full necklace style you wear around your neck, kids will probably get tired of weaving before then so you can make shorter lanyards for keychains like these from Oh Yay Studio. You can use plastic lacing, paracord or even yarn to make these.

There are tons of variations on paracord bracelets and keychains that are fun for kids to make. This keychain from Artsy Fartsy Mama is easy to make and fun for kids to use as backpack charms during the school year.

Friendship bracelets are another classic to make at camp or over the summer. The easiest ones are just braids, like these from The Soccer Mom Blog. The original pattern includes an essential oil diffuser button bead, but you can leave the oils out and just have a cute braided bracelet if you’d rather.

Or you can use yarn to make classic bracelets with this tutorial from Simplify Create Inspire. This one uses a cardboard circle to help keep your strands separate until you need to knot them.

While we’re on the subject of yarn, you can’t forget the God’s eye (which is the only craft I really remember making the time I went to camp). There are a bunch of tutorials for these, and once you start making one you’ll probably remember how to do it without any assistance. I like this one from Make and Takes, which includes fun beaded accents, too.

Bring a little nature into your summer crafts by decorating walking sticks for you next nature walk. You can paint them, like these from Crafts by Courtney, or wrap them in yarn like Babble Dabble Do did. Or find a Y-shaped stick to make a shaker like this one from Minie Co., or use them for weaving, which I shared at Our Daily Craft.

Do you have a favorite camp craft for kids? I’d love to hear about it!

When my daughter was younger I would spend a lot of time trying to come up with activities she could do in the car on long road trips and things to entertain her when we were waiting at restaurants and things that didn’t involve screens.

But it turns out there are a lot of great activities you can do with just a piece of paper and a pen.

What Do We Do All Day has a great collection of pen and paper games, including some that can be done with just one person, though they’re all more fun if you have at least two.

There are some classics on here like hangman and dots and boxes, but there are also quite a few I hadn’t heard of before.

I don’t want to spoil the whole list for you because you should definitely click over there and look around, but I will share about the one that you see pictured above.

This game is called Bridges, and you start by making the big random shape and the dividing it into a bunch of sections (the post says 30-50 sections is ideal but I think this one is smaller than that).

Each player gets their own color marker and you take turns drawing bridges from one space to another, crossing a third. Once there’s a bridge, no other bridges can start, end or cross in those spaces. Keep going until no more bridges can be built, and the person who makes the last bridge wins.

Check out the post over at What We Do All Day for more great ideas for no or almost-no prep games you can play with your kids or that kids can play together. I’d love to know if you have a favorite paper and pen game, whether it’s on this list or a different one.

[Photo: What We Do All Day]

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