Tis’ the season to get crafty! Christmas is only a few days away and I have a fun holiday project that you can do with your children to get them into the spirit. I came up with this idea after cleaning up our cluttered “wrapping station” and noticed we had quite a few empty boxes to break down for trash pick up. Using paper plates and a brown box flap, I assembled a Christmas tree for Toodie to paint. When she was all done personalizing her tree we hung it by the door to greet guests during the holiday festivities this week.

For this project you will need the following:

• 21 small sized paper plates
• flap from brown shipping box or a piece of cardboard
• assorted colors of washable Crayola paint
• paint brush
• glitter
• Elmer’s glue
• hot glue gun (for attaching plates together & trunk)
• decorative embellishments (sequins, stones, jewels,etc.)

When all of the materials are gathered you can begin working on assembling the Christmas tree itself. Here are the steps to take:

• Using a hot glue gun, begin attaching the small paper plates together in rows. The bottom row will have 6 plates, the next 5, and so on until you reach the very top of the tree where you will have one. Make sure plates are overlapped about half way and secure. If not, the plates will flop around from the weight. After each row is made you can glue them together on top of the other.

• Using a variety of Crayola colored paints allow your child to decorate the tree to their liking. You can keep it traditional by painting the tree green or like Toodie, use a different color for each plate.

• Once the paper plates are dry use Elmer’s glue to draw on different sizes of circle like ornaments. Sprinkle glitter or sequins on top for sparkling decorations. Ribbon, sequins, gems, felt, construction paper, tissue paper, and fluffy colored balls can all be used to personalize.

• While the glitter ornaments are drying you can prepare your trunk and also the star which will be placed on top. Trace a yellow star out of construction paper or a paper plate. Paint yellow if necessary and glue it on top of the tree. You can also use a holiday bow as a star. 

• Cut the flap off of a brown shipping box. Paint brown and trim if needed. Using a hot glue gun attach it to the bottom of your tree, giving it a trunk.

• If you are going to hang the tree as decoration you may want to attach a fishing line or string to the back of the star.