Recycled Christmas Tree Craft

This is a really simple craft for the Christmas season.

First, give each child a piece of cardboard. It does not matter what size it is - most of ours were about 12X12 or smaller. Paint the cardboard green.


Once it is dry, give each child a big pile of water bottle caps - or any small lid really. I have a drawer in the kitchen that I fill with caps of all sizes and shapes.

Using the caps, have them create the pattern of a tree on their cardboard. This is a good counting game as well. One cap on the first row, two caps on the next row etc.


Once they have a shape they like, have them glue each cap to the cardboard.


Once all the caps are glued down, start filling the caps with a bit of glue. Give each child a pile of beads and let them drop the beads into the glue. Repeat.


This part is easy enough for really small children as long as you supervise them - they tend to want to eat the beads.


Once all of the caps are filled with beads, use a paintbrush to add a trunk on the tree and you are done!