Chicka Chicka Boom Boom Cheap Craft

This morning I am home working in the office while Sierra is at daycare. Upon opening up a few large envelopes and throwing them in the recycle bin, an idea came to me.

I purchased a bunch of those ABC fridge magnets at a thrift store a while ago and they have been waiting for the right time to bring them out.

I came up with this activity which I will surprise Sierra with when she comes home: A Chicka Chicka Boom Boom magnet board made from recycled envelopes!

Here's a basic tutorial if you'd like to give it a try!

1) Gather your materials.
You will need:
Two large envelopes from your recycling (Cut open)
Green and Brown shades of paint and paint brushes
Scissors, Glue sticks, pencil
A cookie sheet (Use one you have or I bought this one at the dollar store- 2 for .99)

Edited to add: Make sure if you go and buy a cookie sheet that it is magnetic as not ALL cookie sheet are.

2) Select some large envelopes from your recycling bin. Mine were a beige colour but really white, yellow, anything will work fine. (We get a lot of large envelopes in the mail with our business)

2) With a pencil trace around a cookie sheet onto one of the envelopes. Cut it out a bit smaller then your line so it will fit inside the tray. You can leave it plain as I have, or you could paint on the ground and sky colours.

3) Take another piece of the envelope and paint it all green. You can add different shades for variation. Paint another envelope with brown. Allow to dry. When they are dry, draw a trunk shape and leaf shape and cut out to be your pattern.


4) Cut out your patterns and lay the trunk on the brown painted paper and the leaf on the green painted paper. Trace 1 trunk and 5 leaves. Cut these out.
6) Glue your trunk to your paper which fits inside your cookie sheet. Glue on the 5 leaves. It is OK if the leaves extend a bit off of the paper. You can trim them off so it all still fits on the page. As pictured below, I had to snip off one leaf tip.

7) Now place the whole sheet inside your cookie tray. If the corners curl you can secure it with double sided tape so it is easily removed, but stays in place while playing. You could also mac tac the paper for extra durability.

8) Provide some ABC magnets and play along with the BOOK and DVD!

I found this link which provides other Chicka Chicka Boom Boom activities to extend the learning. Do you have any favourite Chicka Chicka Boom Boom activities you'd like to share?