Image Credit:  Abundant Family Living (Tina Truelove)

Footprint and Handprint Keepsake Crafts

Upon arrival this morning, one of my preschoolers informed me that his Nana’s birthday is today and both his daddy and his meme celebrate their birthdays tomorrow.  He wanted to make them a special card.  We love doing footprint and handprint keepsake crafts so we did an internet search for ideas.  We found so many cute examples so we decided to do several of our own.

Image Credit:  Abundant Family Living (Tina Truelove)

We started painting his foot.

Image Credit:  Abundant Family Living (Tina Truelove)

  Then, we pressed his painted foot onto white paper.

Image Credit:  Abundant Family Living (Tina Truelove)

We chose several colors and after several minutes, we had enough foot prints and handprints to make several keepsake crafts.

Image Credit:  Abundant Family Living (Tina Truelove)

 This is our footprint tractor.

Image Credit:  Abundant Family Living (Tina Truelove)

 Our Footprint Lion

Image Credit:  Abundant Family Living (Tina Truelove)

Our Snowman

 

Image Credit:  Abundant Family Living (Tina Truelove)

 Our Penguin

Image Credit:  Abundant Family Living (Tina Truelove)

 Our Bee

Image Credit:  Abundant Family Living (Tina Truelove)

 

Image Credit:  Abundant Family Living (Tina Truelove)

Our Butterfly

Image Credit:  Abundant Family Living (Tina Truelove)

Our Fish

This is the one my little guy chose to give to his daddy for his birthday gift.

Image Credit:  Abundant Family Living (Tina Truelove)

We chose this card for his Nana.  We made the same card for his Meme, but with a different color card.  I pasted white paper on the inside so my little guy could draw his Nana and his Meme a special birthday picture, which he did.

Image Credit:  Abundant Family Living (Tina Truelove)

We found an example of a handprint birthday cake we liked.  We didn’t use it for a birthday card today, but we made one anyway just because we liked it.

Helpful Hint:  When painting the child’s hand, remember NOT to paint the thumb for this particular handprint keepsake craft.  The four fingers make nice candles but the thumb just sort of sticks out – all out of place.  I learned this the hard way.  I ended up cutting out the handprint, cutting off the thumb, and then pasting it onto solid colored paper.  Maybe we will save this one for the next special day in his family.

Footprint and handprint crafts are also great for other special days such as Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, Easter and Christmas cards.  Valentine’s Day is coming up so these ideas are perfect for parent and grandparent Valentine’s Day cards.  They are great for aunts and uncles too!

Another footprint and handprint keepsake option is to use a mold to create stepping stones, table top, or wall decorations.  I have created several handprint and footprint molds using different materials.  Plaster of Paris is OK, but it is very fragile.  If you are familiar with ceramics, you can make a ceramic handprint mold.  We have also poured cement into pie pans and then pressed hands and feet into the cement to create keepsake molds.  Cement molds work well.  They are durable and you can paint them to make them more attractive, but they are also heavy.

You may also like:  Flower Craft for Spring

Flower Craft for Spring