Recycled Christmas Ornaments & Decorations Kids Can Make

Did you know lots of items found in your recycling bin can be used to make adorable Christmas ornaments and decorations? Making homemade recycled Christmas ornaments and decorations is a fantastic way for kids to express their creativity while also learning about sustainability. Reusing recyclables from around the house to create upcycled art and crafts is a great way to teach children how something that's been used can still be transformed into something beautiful, rather than being discarded.

These handmade decorations help the environment, are a budget friendly gift option and can also become a personal, heart warming tradition to include in your holiday celebrations. In this post, we’ll share fun and easy ideas for creating eco-friendly Christmas decorations kids can help make. Lots of these would also be great to make as affordable class take home gifts.

Popsicle Stick Snowflakes

Popsicle stick snowflakes are a super easy, affordable and fun way for children to create their own handmade decorations. They're fun to make during winter or at Christmas time and let kids recreate the sparkly magic of snowflakes inside to brighten up the house. Follow our easy step by step instructions to learn how make your own popsicle stick snowflakes with your kids.

Ugly Christmas Sweater Collage Craft for Kids

My kids love nothing more than being given a variety of craft items and being able to free range and create masterpieces, so it's no surprise that collage and process art activities are high on rotation here. This ugly Christmas sweater collage craft we did this week is a perfect way to incorporate collage into Christmas crafts.

I've created a free printable blank ugly Christmas sweater template you can download and use to make this craft with your kids or students too. 

December Play Activity Ideas for Toddlers & Preschoolers + Free Play Calendar PDF

I'm putting together monthly play calendars to make it easy for you to create a month of fun for your kids at home or in the classroom, every month of the year. December includes Christmas and New Years Eve, so to celebrate the festive season the December play calendar focuses on Christmas trees, DIY ornaments, Santa and the reindeer and fireworks themed ideas for toddlers, preschoolers and school kids. The activities include a mix of art and craft, sensory, science and play ideas as well as books to read aloud during the month.

Each activity is explained in detail below, including how you can extend or adjust the activity based on your child's age. You can also download our free interactive December activity calendar pdf with links to instructions for every activity to save for future reference.

33 Christmas Toilet Paper Roll Crafts for Kids

We love using toilet paper rolls for lots of different crafts at our place, there's literally hundreds of different crafts, games and DIY toys that can be made from toilet paper rolls. We've used them for Halloween toilet paper roll crafts so it makes sense to put together a list of Christmas toilet paper roll crafts as well.

These Christmas cardboard tube crafts can easily be done by preschoolers or school children as a classroom art project. Make these cute gingerbread men, elves, Christmas trees, reindeer, Christmas decorations and of course Santa himself. Use them to decorate the classroom or your home for Christmas or in small world play.

DIY Christmas Sweater Ornaments

These DIY Christmas sweater ornaments are the perfect Christmas craft for kids of all ages to make during the holiday season. Children can colour in our free printable black and white Christmas sweater template however they like to create their very own Christmas sweater designs {no sewing needed!}. 

As a bonus these ornaments are also a cute keepsake you can bring out to decorate the Christmas tree with each year.

Buddy Elf Toilet Paper Roll Craft

The girls love watching Christmas movies each year from November onwards and one of our favourite ones is Elf. Buddy the elf, who's actually a human that was raised as an elf at the North Pole, is as obsessed with Christmas as my kids, so naturally he's one of their favourite Christmas characters. It helps that Will Ferrell is hilarious and infectious in his portrayal as Buddy and you can't help but wish you were Buddy's friend in real life.

To bring Buddy to life in our house we decided to make a toilet paper roll Buddy elf that's inspired by the real Buddy and the movie Elf, including his striped hat, green jacket and yellow tights. Get our free printable elf template and follow the instructions below to make your own Buddy inspired elf.

Rudolph Toilet Paper Roll Craft

With his shining red nose that saves Christmas, Rudolph the red nosed reindeer is the most famous reindeer of all. Children can make their very own Rudolph with this simple toilet paper roll reindeer craft. Upcycle a humble toilet paper roll, with a few other basic craft items, by following our step by step instructions to bring Rudolph to life.

We love toilet paper roll crafts in our house because toilet paper rolls are the most readily available craft resource and they're free! Plus they're recyclable so they're good for the environment. Check out our favourite Halloween toilet paper roll crafts and Christmas toilet paper roll crafts.

Santa Paper Cup Puppet {+ Free Template}

If you're looking for a cute Santa craft to try this Christmas, make this paper cup Santa puppet. With just a few basic craft supplies your kids can make a Santa puppet that waves his arms up and down. Follow our instructions below to learn how to make an articulated Santa puppet using paper cups and our free printable Santa template.