It's really easy to work on fine motor skills with your kids using everyday materials around the house. At least that's the main goal behind the series Everyday Fine Motor Materials from A to Z series (hosted by Still Playing School). You'll discover lots of hands-on fine motor crafts and fine motor activities that use what you already have on hand. Or, at the very least, they'll use easy to find materials from the dollar store.
One everyday craft supply that you can find at the dollar store is a pack of colored craft feathers. I personally like to keep them on hand for different crafts and sensory activities.
Our most recent craft idea using feathers is this colorful feather bowl fine motor craft. My two boys worked on it together and it's seriously gorgeous. I cannot get enough of it. Like look at it! Isn't it pretty?!
What You'll Need for this Feather Bowl Fine Motor Craft
At first glance, this feather bowl craft might look complicated. But I promise it's not. Here's what you'll need to make one of your own:
- Colored craft feathers - All crafts with feathers for kids need feathers, right? That's what makes it a feather craft after all. So it's kind of a given that you'd need some feathers for this one...
- Plastic wrap - The plastic wrap is used to form the base of our bowl. It's what our feathers will stick to in a bit.
- Medium sized glass bowl - Although if you wanted to make a larger feather bowl, then you could certainly try a bigger bowl size. How big you want it is up to you.
- Mod Podge - As cool as it would be for the feathers to magically stick to the bowl, they won't. Mod Podge is what we used to keep the feathers in place.
- Scissors - To cut the feathers into smaller pieces. Your kids can cut them ahead of time or while they're in the process of making the bowl. Either or works.
- Paint brushes - To add the Mod Podge to the surface of our bowl and because painting is fun.
Then all you need are some eager little crafters to put the project together. My two boys worked on this feather craft together. Here's a glimpse at what we're making here.
How to Make this Beautiful Feather Bowl Craft
Step 1: Flip your glass bowl upside down. Now wrap the entire surface of the glass bowl in plastic wrap. You are only wrapping the outside of the bowl.
Step 2: Use the paint brushes to coat the plastic wrapped bowl with a generous amount of Mod Podge. Thankfully my boys are generous painters to begin with, as you can see...
Step 3: Cut the stems off of the feathers. My boys also cut the feathers into smaller pieces, which, honestly, worked better than leaving the feathers long. So I recommend cutting the feathers into smaller pieces as well.
Step 4: Place feathers around the bowl and press them down into the Mod Podge to stick.
Step 5: Cover the entire bowl and feathers with another coat of Mod Podge. I had to help with this part as the feathers had a tendency to move and wiggle while the boys tried to paint over top of them. Once covered, leave the bowl to dry. We left ours overnight.
Once the bowl was dry, we slowly peeled the plastic wrap off of the glass bowl. I then folded the plastic wrap at the top of the bowl inside so that it had a nice finished edge. That's it!
The bowl holds its shape well. But, please note, that it is not intended to hold heavy objects. Nor is it to be used as a bowl to eat out of. Instead, it's a decorative piece. It's art.
Update as of May 2022: This bowl has held together amazing even after almost 8 years! All of their generous gluing paid off.
The Finished Feather Craft for Kids
The boys loved posing and showing off their feathered creation. I can't say I blame them because look how cool the finished bowl is. I'm totally obsessed with how it turned out.
This post is part of the Everyday Fine Motor Materials from A to Z series hosted by Still Playing School. Just click on the image below to see all of the other amazing fine motor ideas in the series. But only after you make a feather bowl of your own first, okay?
