As Chinese New Year is approaching, I have been thinking of Chinese crafts for kids that I could try with my 2 year old, Mr R. We decided to start with fans as they are so easy yet look really effective.
I selected lots of different coloured sugar paper and we folded them into concertinas by folding one piece, the folding it back on itself, then folding another – until the whole paper has been folded. If your child is going to paint on the fan it can be easier to do this before hand, and Mr R enjoyed experimenting with painting within the fold lines and the slight dips that had been created even once the sheet was flattened out again.
Although Red is traditionally the prominent colour at Chinese New Year, we decided to use all different colours for the fans to add more variety , but stuck to using red paint.
I was inspired by a cherry blossom lantern craft by Laughing Kids Learn recently (definitely check it out, it looks amazing and was done by her 2 year old!) so I wanted to try something similar for a design on some of our fans. I drew some basic branches on the fan template with black pen and then Mr R used his fingers to add dabs of colour to make the blossom.
As you can see above, I really don’t have any artistic ability whatsoever! Luckily Mr R is too young to notice so he was happy to add his cherry blossom fingerprints onto the “trees” I had created for him.
He printed his paint on quite carefully, thinking where to place each finger print rather than just splashing it everywhere as he would have done when he was a little younger.
Here’s his finished cherry blossom waiting to be folded and taped.
We also did another cherry blossom design using pink and white tissue paper circles, to resemble some of the colours of blossom. Mr R stuck these onto this fan to make whatever design he liked.
PVA glue is better than pritt stick for this.
Next we decided to do some designs by using coins in the paint and printing them onto the fan templates – as coins are given for good luck in Chinese New Year. Mr R loved printing with the coins.
As you can see this activity was good to help along his fine motor skills by practising his pincer grip to keep picking up the coin out of the paint. These are plastic pretend coins from a set of play money from the pound shop.
I also wanted to try an activity to make a Chinese writing picture. This one did not work out in the end, but I’ll show you the idea and maybe you will have more luck with it. I searched for how to write some Chinese characters for Chinese New Year. My idea was to mark the words out on the paper in masking tape
Then Mr R painted all over the page:
The idea was that once the painting was dry, we could peel off the masking tape leaving the word underneath in yellow, surrounded by the red paint. Unfortunately, the tape I used did not peel off cleanly. It took some of the paint with it, and ripped some of the paper so that was a little disappointing. At least Mr R enjoyed painting on the masking tape anyway, as it was a bit different than just painting on plain paper. If you have any suggestions of what kind of tape would be better to use for this kind of idea, then do let me know in the comments.
Our final activity of the morning was to paint hand prints on to the page which we can later turn into a Chinese New Year’s dragon picture:
The dragon is not yet finished, so I will update with that another time but the basic idea was to put 3 handprints in a row facing downwards which gives a roughly dragon-ish shape!
Here are our finished fans:
Mr T and Mr Z were quite interested in them when they came home from school:
And Mr Z suggested attaching them all together to make a giant rainbow fan, so we did that:
My friend Eileen also posted about how to make Chinese New Year fans on her blog Et Speaks from Home, so have a look! Eileen is Chinese from Singapore and she has a whole series on Chinese New Year on the blog at the moment.
If you’re looking for Sheep crafts, for 2015 Chinese New Year Year of the Sheep, take a look at our paper plate sheep
Chinese New Year Crafts
- Chinese New Year Greetings (with Free Printables for Crafts)
- Chinese New Year Treasure Hunt Activity for Kids
- How to Make Red Envelopes for Chinese New Year
- Chinese New Year Color By Number Pages (Free Printable)
- Free Chinese New Year Printables and Activities for Kids
- Chinese New Year Shaker
- Chinese Stories from Snowflake Books
- Recycled TP Roll Chinese Lanterns for Chinese New Year
- Paper Plate Chinese Lantern Craft for Chinese New Year
- Chinese Recipes to Celebrate Chinese New Year
Anna Marikar, mum of four and seasoned blogger, has spent over a decade sharing her parenting journey and passion for kid-friendly crafts and free printables.
Her easy-to-follow craft ideas and practical parenting advice have transformed In The Playroom into a cherished resource for parents.
Some lovely ideas here and Mr R looks like he is having a great time!
What a lovely idea. I think it’s soooo nice that you’re happy for your little ones to get really “hands on” with the paint too.
Beautiful idea – you make it look so fun too. My kids love getting stuck in and covered in paint. This definitely going on our list of crafts for this weekend. Thanks for sharing – pinned!
That’s a wonderful idea and lovely to see the little ones enjoying it. xx
Such a wonderful idea. We love making fans in our house too 🙂 x
This is a lovely idea, he looked like he had loads of fun, so simple but great results!
Thanks for sharing such a great post.
Helen X
http://www.allthebeautifulthings.co.uk
What a great activity for younger kids to get involved with. The fans are so colourful and putting them all together is a lovely idea.
They look great – so easy but great fun!
What a fab simple craft for Chinese New YEar
What a great idea! I love the thumb and coin painting. It looks like you all had lots of fun – if only the weather was better. You can break out the fans again in summer 🙂
Mr R – these are beautiful and I really like the cherry blossom fan. You’re so clever and I think your Mum is awesome to have helped you. Thanks for linking up to #minicreations love Grace xxx
Mr R – these are beautiful and I really like the cherry blossom fan. You’re so clever and I think your Mum is awesome to have helped you. Thanks for linking up to #minicreations love Grace xxx
Such cute photos of fingerprinting 🙂 Looks like they had great fun making these fans. thanks for the idea x
They look great, and fun to do as well.
these look so fun, I bet Wilf would enjoy these too! x
Love these, must pin them for later! Perhaps washi tape would work?
I love things like this – simple and fun x x
I love the fact that there are so many things you can do with fans! I think my two would love this – going to give it a whirl at the weekend.
You’ve all been busy, some great ideas to get crafty with children.
These look wonderful – especially the fans. I’m going to try that with my children. Looks like it was fun and messy, but not too tricky for me.
He looks like he is really enjoying himself.
I love seeing kids getting messy
Oh they’re pretty – I used to love making these as a child, and I never think to do it with my kids. Thanks for inspiring me 🙂
These are beautiful xx
Simple and cute. MashaAllah
What lovely pictures! I love crafts where I can have as much fun getting messy as they wee ones too. lolz.
I am tempted to do a grown up version of this craft too.
I am a new follower to your blog via Bloglovin & The Social Media Saturday Hop.
I realize I am a few days late and for this I am sorry.
the amout of times i have bought the kids a big pad of paper and they have made hundrds of fans lol , never gets ild x
Some great ideas! I love making and creating and my four take after me. We have already made some concertina Chinese dragons!
I do think my reception class would love this activity !
I remember making something similar as a child … mmmm I think adults should be allowed to ‘play’ with paper and paint like this … such fun! 🙂
These are beautiful! Keep up the good work!
Such a great twist on fan making. I love the cherry blossom design. So bright and eye catching! Pinning 🙂
Looks like fun! My kids love anything that involves paint and/or getting messy 🙂
These look like great fun to make. Nice to see ideas that my munchkin would be able to engage in. We struggle to hold her attention for long with crafting.
Looks like the kids really enjoyed themselves! 🙂
These are so simple yet look effective – love the finger painting on them.
Thank you so kindly for crediting this idea back. I LOVE the idea of making fans! I’ll have to e sure to give this a go myself. Great work! 🙂
You’re welcome – I really did love yours!
Gorgeous fans! I love that even little ones can join in the creative process. Thanks for linking up with Mom’s Library, I’ll be featuring you this week at Crystal’s Tiny Treasures. Happy New Year!
thanks so much! so exciting to be featured 😀
Fans are a classic – but lovely to use the fingerprint painting to make cherry blossom 🙂
Thanks for the mention. These fans look great!
Love the fans….think my eldest would love to make those!
These turned out so pretty! I love that even the youngest kids can make a pretty fan!
What a neat idea! They turned out really pretty :). Found you through Throw back Thurs LP 🙂
Nice craft ideas. I JUST got an email from Michaels Arts and Crafts, and they were promoting paper crafts and giving all sorts of ideas. I would like to do origami with my nephew…I think he would like it. I also want to make Chinese paper lanterns.
Where can I buy sugar paper in the States? Thanks.
Such cute fans! Will be pinning to make sure I don’t forget them for Chinese new year!
#goldenoldies
What a great activity – perfect for so many ages, and a range of occasions too! #GoldenOldies
There is a tape called Removable tape – it is best to steer clear of masking tape – it does not peel from paper and card but always bring some away with it!! Removable tape is clear like sellotape but easily peels off without tearing the paper.