What to do with Nature Items Your Toddler Brings Home - 2 DIY Home Decor Projects

As a mom with a toddler, we do our best to interact and explore the outdoors at every opportunity.  Being outside offers a multitude o...

What to do with Nature Items Your Toddler Brings Home - The Hippie Art Studio

2 DIY Home Decor Projects to Make with Your Toddler - The Hippie Art Studio
As a mom with a toddler, we do our best to interact and explore the outdoors at every opportunity.  Being outside offers a multitude of potential learning experiences.  And my daughter loves being outside - a lot more than she enjoys being inside!  We play outside with chalk, paint, and balls.  We go to the park and swing and slide and play in her sandbox.  But the biggest part of our outside time happens during our daily nature walks.

Toddlers are true explorers of our world.  They want to know what everything is.  They touch and feel the world around them and pretty much anything they can get their hands on!  Atty asks about the noises she hears and new things she sees on our walks.  She'll often comment on the wind as it blows through her hair or ask if I hear the bird singing somewhere close by.  And then, of course, we have to try and find the bird too!  This is a special and treasured time as we explore the world together.

Nature Box for Storing Random Bits

She also picks up random bits and bobs that we find on our walks.  She's done this ever since we started our daily nature walks.  Some days it might be a special stick that works really well as a drum stick and others it could be a pile of rocks that tickled her fancy.  Everything she collects goes into her nature box where she can continue to explore and discover new things about her special pieces.

Nature Box for Storing Random Bits Picked Up by Your Toddler - The Hippie Art Studio
Every so often the box starts to get full and we need to repurpose these treasures.  So we make fun art projects that we can continue to enjoy.  Last summer we made a sculpture piece using a recycled egg carton and a selection of pieces from Atty's nature box.
Recycled Egg Carton Project - The Hippie Art Studio

Recycled Egg Carton Project

Supplies -
  • paint or markers
  • nature objects
  • egg carton or recycled cardboard
  • Aleene's tacky glue
First, she painted the carton with some paint dobbers and her chalk paint.  Then she selected the pieces she wanted to add and told me where she wanted to place them.  I applied some Aleene's Tacky Glue and adhered the pieces on to the egg carton.  The Aleene's holds pretty much anything on - even rocks and sticks!  Once her masterpiece was completed and dry, we hung it on our art wall.  She still enjoys looking at it and touching the special treasures she chose to include.

DIY Wall Hanging Project with Nature Items - The Hippie Art Studio

DIY Wall Hanging Project

Recently, we had acquired some pieces that were too large for the nature box and were taking up a lot of space on our kitchen table, where they had been put temporarily.  We've had several bad spring storms that came with high winds and tornados, so she's been picking up a lot of sticks and small branches from nearby trees.
I decided to create some DIY wall hanging decor pieces for her room using these branches and sticks.  I created both of these DIY home decor pieces in a total of 15 minutes.  You could also get your children involved in the creation and add paint or markers to the sticks as a fun alternative to the ribbon and fabric.


Supplies -
  • Sticks
  • Scrap ribbons, string, fabric
  • Other nature items to attach to string or ribbon
  • Optional : Paint and markers
I simply wrapped ribbon around the branches and used additional ribbon or string to attach some of her larger nature items to the sticks.  I used Aleene's Tacky Glue to help hold the ribbon onto the sticks, as well as some decorative duct tape.  I love how these turned out.  These DIY wall hanging are a really simply way to incorporate nature into our home.

DIY Wall Hanging Project with Scrap Ribbon and Fabric - The Hippie Art Studio
I'm constantly trying to find new ways for Atty to interact with the natural world.  How do you add nature into your toddler's (or child's) environment?

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