Simple Nature Inspired Easter Craft for Toddlers

Easter is near and you may be looking for some simple, affordable activities and crafts. Maybe you want to create some beautiful child-made art for Easter decor. Well, today I bring you a simple, nature inspired Easter craft perfect for toddlers and offers a nice looking product for Easter displays.

Benefits of nature play

There is a reason most people say, “A little fresh air is good for the soul.” Nature really helps mental well-being. In fact, during lockdown something that kept Chris and my sanity was our daily walk around the neighborhood. Fresh air and sunshine really helped me feel better.

This is the same for toddlers. Getting outside or even incorporating some nature items in their indoor play, helps them feel grounded and more at peace.

Benefits of using nature in play and art:

Free
Beautiful
Grounding
Multi-sensory
Elements for scientific exploration (texture, weight, color, size)
Critical thinking and problem solving skills
Language development opportunities

With all of these benefits it’s a simple choice to use nature items for Easter crafts for toddlers. Read on to see how we used nature to create a beautiful Easter craft.

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Materials

The fun part about this Easter craft is that you can get your toddler involved in collecting the materials. We have river rock as part of our landscaping, so that made it easy to collect the materials needed. Ruby loved to go around the yard to collect the perfect rocks.

We used acrylic paint because it adheres better to the rocks than tempera. Just watch out, acrylic stains, so be sure to use a smock if you care about your toddler’s clothes.

Ruby wore her mommy and me matching apron (she loves when we wear our matching aprons), but I found the perfect toddler art smock after we did this craft that I plan to use for future art and messy activities.

Here’s what you’ll need:

Rocks (preferable smooth egg-shaped rocks)
Acrylic paint
Paintbrush
Art smock (if you care about your toddler’s clothes getting messy/stained)

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The Process

The beauty of process art (especially when it is multi-step) is that it promotes creative thinking skills. Instead of seeing nature items (in this case rocks) as something only for outside, toddlers will begin to expand their thinking and realize rocks can be used in multiple ways.

Read more about Process art with children HERE.

For this nature inspired Easter craft, I decided to involve Ruby in the whole process. It extended this Easter craft over several days.

First, we played in the backyard and collected egg-shaped rocks. We talked about finding the ones that were oval. We practiced following multi-step directions (ex. “Pick up the rock and put it in the bin.”). I also told her we were collecting the rocks to wash and paint (both things she loves).

The next day, I set out a bin with soapy water, a scrubber brush, and the rocks. I asked Ruby to wash them so we could paint them. She loves waterplay so this was a perfect way to involve her in the process.

Finally, the next day we took out the acrylic paints and painted away. I chose pastel colors to make it feel more Eastery, but besides that I let her use the materials in an open-ended way. I painted alongside her, but I didn’t tell her how to create or what it needed to look like.

To involve her in the process further, I let her help wash the paint brushes and paint tray. We have a stool that she uses to reach the sink.

Allowing her to help teaches her responsibility and shows her that she is capable. Children love to help at a young age so it is important to foster a love of helping and involve them in household chores.

I have seen many people use kitchen helpers with their toddlers. I found this stool and it was much more affordable. It is the perfect height for Ruby to help at the sink and kitchen counter.

It doesn’t have full sides, but it hasn’t been much of a problem. We always supervise and she has learned how to be safe.

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Extend your play

After the rocks are painted and dry, you can use them in a variety of ways.

You can:

Extend the art by adding stickers or drawing lines with permanent markers
Use them as indoor or outdoor Easter decor
Do practice Easter egg hunts
Use them for pretend play
Add them to your loose part collection
Combine them with sensory play bases (sand, water, play dough, etc.)

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Final thoughts

Easter crafts for toddlers are best when they focus on the process and are left open-ended. They are even better when you can use nature items. This simple nature inspired Easter craft for toddlers yields a beautiful end product and can be used in multiple ways beyond just hanging on the wall during Easter only.

Let me know how you would use these rocks in the comments below.

You might also find these posts interesting:

How to Use Process Art with Children

10 Process Art Gifts You can Make with your Toddler

50+ Water Play Ideas

What’s the Deal with Sensory Play