These simple napkin rings jazz up any celebration and a perfect craft for the little ones to help out during any holiday, especially Christmas and Thanksgiving.  A great center idea for the classroom, and makes a nice gift for mom and dad.

Cut paper tubes (paper towel rolls or wrapping paper tubes) into desired width. We cut about two inches wide. Then decorate the rings to match the holiday!

• Choose paint colors and sponge paint the rings. Allow the rings to dry and then roll a napkin and insert it through napkin ring.
• Use glitter glue, buttons, confetti or other items to decorate.

If you use paper napkins you can decorate those too.

Mother’s Day is a fun day to celebrate all the things mom’s do. Here are a few simple ideas to show mom you care and have a little fun as a family!

Coupon Book

Make a book full of coupons for mom to use when she needs it the most in the next year! Fold up pieces of paper and staple at the binding. Decorate the cover and fill in the coupon pages. What chores need to be done around the house? What would your mom really appreciate? A few ideas could be “I will wash all the dishes after dinner while you take a walk or bath,” “I will pay a game with you,” “This coupon good for one car wash,” and “This coupon good for one bear hug!”

Picnic Basket Lunch

Prepare a picnic lunch in a basket full of her favorite snacks and go to a park with the family. There is something about spreading out a picnic blanket and having all your favorite people around that is all enduring to a mother!

Take Mom on a Trip (pretend)

Does your mom love the beach? Decorate one room in the house that brings the beach to mom. Use butcher paper to paint or draw the ocean and a colorful sunset and put on the wall. You can even bring beach chairs and a play pool if possible. Have dinner or a picnic at the beach. You can have ocean sounds playing in the background and decorate with seashells!

Does she love Paris or want to go? Prepare a picnic with cheese, baguettes, and wine with French music in the air. Using butcher paper or poster board you could design your own tower. If you have the space in the house or outside put up twinkling lights to make your own private bistro. Ooh, la, la! Moms always appreciate the effort!

Other places to “pretend” go would be Hawaii using leis and items to decorate from a party store and Italy with the checkered tablecloth, Italian music and food.

Flower Pot

Buy a terra cotta pot and decorate. Using paints, children can put their finger prints around the edge or sponge paint the pot. Remember to put their name and the date with a permanent marker. Using items such as buttons, sea shells or fabric, children can create their own design for the flower pot. When the pot is dry, plant a pretty flower for mom to enjoy!

Mom’s always love and appreciate homemade gifts.  These gifts are treasured for years and always remind them of the precious time with their children.  Here are some inexpensive Mother’s Day ideas and crafts for the children to make mom smile!  Click on “read more” to read the whole article.

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Want to give a gift that your mom will cherish and love to bring out year after year? Or, in my case, make yourself a mother’s day keepsake that you can bring out for mother’s day every year. To make this memorable gift you will need a plain cotton table cloth that fits the table you are designing this for, fabric paints, fabric markers and all of the little or big hands of the family.

First, wash the linen and iron if needed then lay out to prepare for hand prints. Remember for the little children to remind them to open their fingers and press down one time on cloth. You may even want to practice with them. This was much easier with another adult ready to clean painted hands right away, unless you do not mind stray marks here and there! I do have a finger print on my table cloth that I now find artistic, although I did not see it at the time. Starting in the middle and working the hands around seems to be the easiest to line up. My sample below has vines to connect the hands but just the hand prints would work just as well.

If you want to have the same color every year you may want to write the color down or buy extras for the following years. To add to this already cute and simple gift you could add linen napkins with fingerprints or another hand print as well as homemade napkin rings. Moms love this kind of thing and will appreciate the thought and love in this table cloth.

This gift continues on every year and eventually will continue with the grandchildren. I love it!