Handprint crafts may be the quintessential “hands-on” crafts that you can do with your children. Your kids will love getting their hands dirty, and you will love having those precious little fingers in an art piece that you will be able to have forever. Of course there are many more benefits that come from helping your kids to make handprint crafts besides the end results. Spending time together is just one way that a family helps to strengthen the bonds between both parent and child and to develop other attributes of healthy growth.
Helping kids to make handprint crafts may be different depending on the ages of the children that you are helping. Young children will obviously not be able to do the same crafts that older children with better dexterity are able to do. Also some craft concepts may be more complicated for younger children to understand (i.e. making mosaic art with finger prints). As a parent you are best suited to know what it is that your children are capable of doing; but in case you would like some suggestions on how you can help children of different ages to make handprint crafts, here are a few ideas:
Ink prints and molds
With an adult’s help even the youngest of children can participate in making handprint crafts by making ink prints and pressing their little hands into a clay mold. Such handprint crafts are excellent ways to make a baby’s first keepsake, and it will be great for distributing to relatives along with the birth announcement. You can make cards, put prints on fabrics, and cut out outlines of your young child’s hand to paste, sew, or otherwise fasten the print onto the object of your choice. Most craft stores have handprint kits available, or you can easily find a handprint kit for babies on the Internet.