Crepe Paper Shamrocks!
The supplies couldn't be easier. Crepe paper, a pencil and school glue. I used an art canvas I had
laying around, but as a kid's craft project, doing this on paper or cardstock would be fine too. I found the crepe streamers at the Dollar store.
First thing you need is a shamrock outline. You want the shape to be pretty large and over-emphasized, since once you add the crepe paper ruffles, the perimeter won't be as obvious.
Next you need lots and lots and LOTS of little paper squares. Using streamers makes this easy, since you just need to wrap the strip around your finger as many times as you can:
Then cut the loops in half which yields little rectangles:
Dip the bottom of the ruffle into some school glue
And stick it down to the canvas/paper:
Repeat with more crepe paper sqaures until you begin tracing the outline of the shamrock:
Once you have the outline finished, you can fill in the rest of the shape:
I had quite a bit of white space left on my canvas, so I used my silhouette to cut out the phrase "Luck O' The Irish" in green vinyl:
Lastly, I painted the edges of the canvas with craft paint, to frame the shamrock:
Even though it is a pretty simple "kid's craft" it doesn't mean you can only tape it to the fridge. You can still incorporate it into a more sophisticated vignette. I added it to the console table under my gallery wall in the dining room:
A few other green items, and you get a little St. Patrick's day display that isn't at all childish.
The whole project took a little less than an hour, and cost $1 plus the cost of the canvas (I think it was around $3). It does get a little redundant, and the kids did lose steam about half way though, but it wasn't hard at all.
Do you have any children's craft projects integrated into your decor? If you don't, it is definitely something to consider!
