Welcome Thanksgiving Turkey Craft for Kids

Autumn is in full bloom and the Thanksgiving holiday is fast approaching. Help get your house ready with some fun and simple Thanksgiving crafts that you and your children can make, creating a warm family welcome for your guests on Thanksgiving Day.

The Welcome Thanksgiving Turkey is a simple craft decoration that most children will be able to do. It only needs a few inexpensive supplies and provides a great rainy day or evening Thanksgiving craft activity for the kids.

To start off you will want to gather the necessary craft supplies. These are as follows: craft glue, scissors, acrylic paint, a piece of plain construction paper, a thin tipped marker, ten large craft sticks, one wide but short craft stick, two medium sized wiggle eyes and some felt. The felt colours you will need are goldenrod, red, black and white.

Once you have your supplies ready you can begin preparing the different parts of your Welcome Thanksgiving Turkey decoration. Begin your Thanksgiving Turkey craft with the goldenrod felt. This will be used to create the Thanksgiving Turkey's body and beak. For the body you will want to cute out a half oval shape, that is a shape that is rounded on the top and flat on the bottom. A guide of about 3 inches wide and 2.5 inches wide should be fine. Next cut out a small triangle for the beak. After you have done this you will no longer need the goldenrod felt so stick this aside and out of the way.

For the next Thanksgiving Turkey piece you will need the red felt. This is to create that little wobbly bit that hangs below the turkey's beak called the gobbler. For this you will want to cut out a long heart shape. Aim for around one inch in size. It's not an exact science so if it's a little bigger or smaller it doesn't matter.

Move next to the Thanksgiving Turkey's top hat. For this you will need the black and white felt. Start off but cutting a simple top hat shape out of the black felt. Then also using the black felt cut out a small square. The small square will make up part of the hat's buckle. Then using the white felt cut out a small white square, but make it slightly bigger than the small black square. This is also part of the Thanksgiving Turkey's hat buckle.

Now you will want to take the large craft sticks and paint, these are for the Thanksgiving Turkey's tail. Immediately put one stick aside as this will remain unpainted. With the remaining nine sticks you will want paint them as follows: four brown, two yellow, two red and one orange.

While your sticks are drying the next step of this Thanksgiving craft is to create the sign. For this you will need a piece of construction paper, the thin tipped marker, the short craft stick and the glue. Cut out a rectangle or square to your liking, then take the marker and write Happy Thanksgiving. Once that is done glue the short craft stick to the back of the paper to complete your Thanksgiving Turkey's sign.

Hopefully your craft sticks are now dry. You will want to take them and create a fan shape, but put one brown stick aside, this will be used for the Thanksgiving Turkey's body. Use the unpainted craft stick as your base. Then at the narrow end glue one stick on top of the other. The colours work best if you put them in this order: brown, yellow, red, brown, yellow, red, orange, brown. Once you have glued the tail together take your remaining brown stick that you earlier set aside and glue it vertically right in the middle of the fan for the turkey's body, with the body stick's half way point hitting the base of the fan.

Next you will want to give the Thanksgiving Turkey craft some shape. Glue the body on first, followed by the red heart above that, then the beak above that, the eyes above that and finally top it all off the top hat. For the top hat first glue on the hat shaped piece, then create the buckle by gluing the white square on to the hat followed by the black square on top of the white square. Finally take your Thanksgiving Turkey's sign and glue the to his body. Set your Thanksgiving Turkey craft aside until it is fully dry.

There are a couple of ways that you can use this Thanksgiving craft around your home. For placing the Thanksgiving Turkey upright as a warm welcome decoration on your entryway table just turn a paper cup upside down and poke the turkey's body stick into it. Or if you prefer you can poke the stick into the side of a potted plant. Another fun idea is to make a number of Welcome Thanksgiving Turkeys and use them as place markers at on the dinner table.