Rainy Day Craft Projects for Kids

It’s said that April showers bring May flowers, but where I live the rainy season definitely isn’t over when April is. These crafts inspired by rainy days are great to make when the weather is awful, or they’re just cute crafts to decorate a classroom for spring.

This little paper umbrella from Easy Peasy and Fun is made with folded paper circles, so if you’ve got a round craft punch the prep on it will be pretty fast. Make them full all around or leave a flat space on the back for hanging on a wall. You can also add raindrops to the edge if you like. So cute!

The Pinterested Parent has a printable umbrella template that kids can decorate, cut out and tape or glue together to make an umbrella. Ths would be fun to do in a classroom and see how kids choose to decorate their umbrellas in different ways or using different media like paint, crayons or colored pencils.

Play with oil pastels and watercolors with this rainy day art project from Projects with Kids. This one looks like so much fun I kind of want to make it myself! There’s a lot of fun techniques in this one, including using pastels as a resist, painting with watercolors and doing blow painting with a straw.

I love this raindrop suncatcher project from Pre-K Pages, too. This one might be best to do with a small group or one on one since it includes using a iron. This technique is a great way to use crayons that are broken or have lost their paper, and you can use other colors and shapes to clean out your craft closet.

Or use the rain as part of your art, like with this project from Nurture Store. Start this project when the rain starts falling, and let nature collaborate in your art!

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Learning about the Weather with Kids

The celebration of Our Lady of Guadalupe is important throughout Mexico and other parts of the world. Her feast day is Dec. 12, and the celebrations honoring her appearance to Juan Diego in 1531 begin a few days before that.

Whether you celebrate yourself or just want to share about the celebration at home or in your classroom, Las Mañanitas: The Beautiful Celebration of Our Lady of Guadalupe is a good place to start. The book, by Ernesto Joel Vega Rosales and Jeanette Gonzalez Seneviratne, with illustrations by Dana Sanmar, tells the story of a family’s celebration of the feast day in both English and Spanish.

They prepare with a novena, which is nine days of prayers and preparations. The children, Lucia and Pablo, are given special outfits made by their grandmother that look like what Juan Diego might have worn when he saw Our Lady. The book describes the prayers that are made each day, such as a prayer for respect for life, for families and for the indigenous people of the Americas, to name a few.

As told in the book, Juan Diego was a native Mexican born near modern day Mexico City. His given name was Cuaauhtlatoatzin, which means “He who speaks like an eagle.” When he converted to Christianity his name was changed to Juan Diego, and as he walked to church he passed a hill called Tepeyac. One day he heard the birds singing especially beautifully and a voice called him to go to the top of the hill.

There he saw Our Lady of Guadalupe, who asked him to tell the bishop she wanted a chapel built in her name at the foot of the hill. The bishop asked for a sign that Juan Diego really saw her, and later she had him collect flowers that she blessed and take them to the bishop. When Juan Diego dropped the flowers, an image of Our Lady could be seen on his cloak, which is still on display in her basilica to this day.

The feast day is celebrated as mañanitas, which includes singing, indigenous music and dancing, and children presenting flowers to Our Lady. Juan Diego is remembered today as being humble, brave and faithful, and was the first indigenous American made a saint.

The book is colorful and tells the story in a clear way, and it’s fun to have it both in English and Spanish if you teach Spanish or speak Spanish at home or in the classroom. It’s a great way to learn the basics of the celebration and the story of Juan Diego and why he is still remembered today.

About the book: 40 pages, paperback, published 2024 by Loyola Press. Suggested retail price $14.99.

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