Make Your Own Snugglepot and Cuddlepie Pendants

Snugglepie and Cuddlepot Pendant Craft for Kids

Looking for Mother’s Day craft ideas? Be inspired by everyone’s favourite Australian book characters and make these adorable Snugglepot and Cuddlepie pendants. Perfect as a weekend activity at home or a lesson plan for the classroom, this low-cost craft idea is suitable for primary school aged children.

This fun, inventive craft can be used as a necklace or even as a gift tag. The project is great way to promote a love of reading and nature, all while improving children’s fine motor skills and relying on natural resources collected from the garden.

Whether you’re a parent or guardian crafting at home or a primary school teacher supporting a group of young learners, you can’t go wrong with a May Gibbs craft project!

You will need:

• Gumnuts (at least 6)
• Gum leaves and other bush finds
• 6 small wood beads
• One quantity of salt dough (see recipe below)
• Hot glue
• Acrylic paints
• Ribbon for hanging and bow
• Paintbrush and pencils

Method:

Step 1: Make your salt dough

First, you’ll need to make your salt dough.

You will need:

• 2 cups of plain flour
• 1 cup of table salt
• 3/4 cups of water
• 1 tablespoon of oil

Mix your ingredients together in a large bowl. You can use a spoon or your hands. Then start crafting your pendants. Try to create a round shape or use a cookie cutter to make pendants in the shape of a gum leaf. Next, you can have fun with patterns! Press leaves and nuts into the dough to bring in natural textures. When you’re happy with the result, poke a hole through the top of the pendant so that you can hang it later.

Lay your salt dough pendants on a tray lined with baking paper and bake in the oven at 120 degrees Celsius for about 2 hours. You may need to turn the pendants over after the first hour. After removing the pendants from the oven, be sure to leave time for them to cool before painting.

Step 2: Make the gumnut babies

Next, it’s time to make the gumnut babies! All you need to do is glue two gumnuts together, joined at the side. Then collect your small beads and use a pencil or a marker to draw faces on these. You can use found items to make hats for the gumnut babies. Try the red caps from flowering gum blossoms!

Use the hot glue to secure the beads to the gumnuts. Remember, this step should only be performed by an adult. Set these aside to dry completely. Similarly, use hot glue to make a posy of gumnuts for the gum leaf pendants.

Step 3: Paint your pendants

Once your salt dough has cooled, you’re ready to start painting! Using acrylic paints, choose some colours that remind you of bush foliage. This could be a blend of reds, greens, and browns. Ask your child or student to help with painting. Then leave the pendants to dry completely. You can add a coat of varnish if you wish.

Step 4: Secure the gumnut babies

Once your salt dough pendants are dry, you can use hot glue to secure the gumnut babies onto the pendants and the posies onto the pendant leaves. To finish, add a hanging ribbon by stringing this through the hole in the salt dough pendant and securing with a knot. You can also add a bow to your pendant as extra decoration.

If you’re searching for a Mother’s Day craft lesson plan, this gumnut pendant craft is a great way to align with the national curriculum for young children, integrating literature and nature in one fun project. It’s also an excellent choice for primary school art teachers wanting to build a connecting between Australian literary texts and values around belonging on Mother’s Day.

Better yet: most of the items needed for this project are easy to find around the classroom or the garden! This makes this Australian-themed Mother’s Day craft a cheap and easy way to get children involved in the fun.

This is a contribution from Crafty Bel! Crafty Bel is here to help stimulate little imaginations and spark a creative flame in little people. Inspired by May Gibbs’ own passion for creative writing and art, Bel helps educators and mums to embrace nature inspired creativity. You can find more of Bel’s work at Mums Take Five.