Twice a month my 8 year old granddaughter comes over to my home for an Arts & Crafts Play Date with Nanny. We’ve been getting together for these special creative play dates since she was 3 1/2 years old. It’s a great way for us to spend bonding time together and a nice way for me to teach her some new skills.
We love to craft together and we enjoy “frugal crafts” that don’t cost a lot of money and we really enjoy upcycling found objects whenever we can. For this particular project I recommend that you use one of those can openers that removes the top of the lid from the soup can, without cutting it. This way the edges of the can will be smooth.
If you enjoy painting on seashells or crafting with seashells…you’ll find over 70+ seashell craft projects right here on the Two Classy Chics blog! We will be sharing more seashell craft projects in the future too!
Kids Crafts: Soup Can and Seashell Pencil Holder
1 Clean and Empty Soup Can
1 Roll of Jute
All Purpose, Fast-Drying Craft Glue
Cheap Paint Brush
Various Sizes, Styles & Colors of Seashells
Turn your clean soup can upside down. Apple all-purpose craft glue using a cheap paint brush around the bottom of the can in a single layer. You don’t need a lot of glue…just a thin layer. Use the brush to spread the glue around 1″ diameter of the can at a time.
Place the jute onto the glue and wrap it around the can in a single layer, making sure the jute touches the previous row (but not on top of it) as you wind it around the can. Apply more glue in the next section and keep wrapping the jute around the can, working your way up to the top and in manageable sections. The glue can dry quickly, so we recommend working in sections. Let dry.
We glued various sized seashells in a variety of styles and colors onto the front of our pencil holder to add decoration. The Princess just made a random pattern with them. The bigger shells we collected from the beach and the smaller “colored/dyed” seashells we picked up at our local dollar-type of store.
If you don’t have seashells, you can decorate the front of your can with colorful buttons, broken jewelry pieces, colorful beads and all sorts of other things.
The Princess made several of these cans to hold items on her desk to keep her pencils, pens, paint brushes and scissors neatly organized. She made two extra ones for me to use in my craft room and I have one holding my gel ink pens and another one holding my crochet hooks. Fun!!!
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Your directions were very clear and easy to follow. These holders are very cute and I love the seashell decorations.
I love this pencil holder. My daughter has a coastal themed room. It would look adorable sitting on her desk.
That is so cute. The girls will love making something like that for us and their other grandmother. Thank you for the idea and directions.
It is so sweet that you and your granddaughter have craft play dates! Shelly, those are memories your granddaughter will always carry with her. I like the pensil craft idea, such a cute and practical item.