‘Tis the season for pumpkins. And October and pumpkin carving go hand-in-hand. But for this year my kids are too little to carve pumpkins (or wield any kind of sharp object, for that matter) and maybe yours are too.  Or maybe you just need a cheap, easy craft idea for all the kids in your house this weekend.  Well, here you go: two easy pumpkin crafts (sans pumpkins).

Everything you need for two easy crafts

#1 PAPER PUMPKINS

The first craft only takes construction paper (or cardstock), scissors, and brass fasteners. Have kids cut some orange paper into strips. I folded my paper to get relatively similar sizes of paper strips. A fun activity at this point might be to have kids or family members each write down things they’re thankful for on these paper strips!

Then gather the strips into a pile.  I also added some leaves atop my pumpkin. Poke a hole through the paper then put the fastener through.

Do the same to the bottom of the strips of paper with another fastener (but no leaves).

Fan out the strips evenly and there you go!  A pumpkin! 

These paper gourds will take on different shapes (just like their real-life counterparts) depending on the amount of leaves, etc you put on top, how many strips you use, and how long the strips are.  In an afternoon you could make quite the pumpkin patch for a mantel display or a Thanksgiving centrepiece!

#2 JAR-O-LANTERNS

The next one gets a bit messy, but it’s fun and I was able to do it with my two-year-old son.

Start with many small pieces of orange tissue paper.  This can be lots of fun tearing or snipping them up!  The more random the shapes, the better, and it’s totally OK if the pieces are crumpled (it just adds to the “textured” look.)

Use a leftover jar from something. Mine was a small jar that once held pesto, but with older children I’ve used large mason jars. If doing this with young children baby food jars would perfectly fit their attention span. Using a paintbrush and some Elmer’s school glue paint on a layer of glue over part of the jar. Over the patch of glue place a piece of tissue paper.

Continue brushing on glue and placing the tissue paper on, patting it down to cling to the jar. (I’m pretty sure my son’s favourite part was saying “pat, pat, pat” as he worked.)

Once the entire jar is covered (with pieces overlapping and crinkled a bit), go back over the whole thing painting on a layer of glue, securing down any loose edges and making the tissue paper cling to the jar as closely as possible.

While that’s drying use black construction paper or cardstock to cut out a little jack-o-lantern face. Brush the back side with glue, stick it to one side of the jar, then paint over it with the glue also.

Once it’s dry you can place a tea light, votive, or battery-operated light inside and enjoy your pumpkin lantern together!

And hey! No sharp tools involved… just some sticky fingers.