Easy Mother’s Day Gifts for Kids to Make

April 28, 2023 by Sarah White Leave a Comment

Of course it’s impossible to generalize what moms want for Mother’s Day (I have always said I wanted a nap), but I think it’s fair to say most moms would like getting a gift that their kid had a hand in making. Here are some easy Mother’s Day gifts that kids can make or help with, that can be made one kid or a group of kids at a time.

We’ve already covered the cuteness of handprint and fingerprint crafts for parents, but this fingerprint heart necklace from Rhythms of Play is another sweet take on that theme. You might not have these supplies on hand if you’re not a big jewelry maker but it should be pretty easy to find them at a big box craft store or online.

Another cute idea for a necklace or keychain is to have kids draw on shrink plastic and make that into a pendant or a keychain loop. This is a pretty quick and easy project and the drawing can have to do with Mother’s Day or not, it would still be special for a mom or grandparent. Get the instructions from Kindergarten Chaos.

Print a special photo and give mom a place to display it with this easy painted rock photo holder from Buggy and Buddy. Little kids can paint the rock and thread the beads while an adult assembles the holder, or older kids can do this whole project themselves.

How about an upcycled planter? These painted can plant holders from the Best Ideas for Kids are easy to make — just make sure the can doesn’t have any sharp bits before you give it to a kiddo to paint. (Of course an adult will need to drill the drain holes as well.)

Or how about a pretty painted Mason jar? Moms can always find a use for a jar. I have one my daughter painted with a handprint on it, or you can make this use jar votive holder from I Heart Arts and Crafts. The heart shape is super cute but you can do stripes or any other simple shape you like.

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Gross Motor Math Ideas

With little kids especially, linking learning to physical activity really does help them learn. Movement can help kids focus, and it just keeps them from sitting still all day, which isn’t good for anyone.

The good news is lots of different learning activities can be adopted to get kids moving while they learn, so let’s look at some math and number activities that use gross motor skills.

Probably the most obvious thing would be hopscotch, which helps kids count while they hop. You can also mix up the numbers, do skip counting with the numbers, give kids a simple math problem and have them hop to the correct answer, and on and on.

This number hop game from Gift of Curiosity is a more chaotic version, with number flash cards on the floor that kids can hop, skip or jump to as you call them out (this one is more for individual number identification than counting). It’s a great indoor option if it’s too hot, cold or rainy out to do traditional hopscotch, too.

This painter’s tape number line idea from Days with Grey doesn’t involve quite as much movement, but kids can move around while they place things on the number line and work on learning about one to one correspondence. In the blog post they use shoes, but you can count anything you’ve got handy. (Be warned when I visited this website had an ad that continually took up the whole page, but you can get the idea pretty quickly.)

One of the important tasks of learning numbers is learning a parent’s phone number just in case it’s ever needed, or how to dial 911 in case on an emergency. Teaching Mama has a great way to practice telephone numbers and get some movement in with a giant telephone keypad made out of paper plates. You can also use this for counting practice, but it’s a great idea for learning phone numbers, too.

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