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Santa Claus Craft For Toddlers with Cotton Balls

Santa Claus Craft For Toddlers with Cotton Balls
 

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A quick and easy Santa Claus craft to make with kids 2 years old and older with little supplies needed.

Santa Claus craft with cotton balls

Christmas is always a fun time for making crafts with the kids. When my daughter turned 2 years old, I jumped on making every simple craft I could with her because I was just so excited!

This Santa craft is specifically designed for toddlers, but older siblings can still have fun making it!

I’ve included directions on how to make this craft as simple as possible for kids as young as 2 years old and how to make this an educational experience for preschoolers!

Because I know cutting out a Santa Claus is not easy, I’ve included a free downloadable template so you can just cut everything out quickly and get the craft going!

I recommend printing it on colored paper or tracing it out on colored construction paper once printed to have the full Santa effect.

Looking for other easy Christmas crafts? Check out this amazing list of Christmas Crafts for 2-3-Year-Olds!

Picture of all supplies needed for the craft


Supplies Needed

  • Santa template (found at the bottom of this post to print out)
  • Construction paper or cardstock – blue, red, white, tan/cream/brown
  •  Cotton balls
  • Small googly eyes
  • Glue or contact paper
  • Scissors

How to Make a Cotton Ball Santa Craft for Xmas

STEP ONE: Cut out the template pieces. You can either print them out directly to the colored paper if your printer allows or cut them out and trace them onto the colored paper.

Picture of all template pieces cut out on colored paper
  • The hat and body will be red
  • The large circle (his face) will be tan/cream/brown
  • The hat brim and pom of the hat will be white
  • The blue paper will stay untouched for the background of the project
Collage of putting the colored paper on the craft and putting cotton balls on

STEP TWO: Glue the body on the bottom of the blue paper. Glue the circle (his face) on top of the body along with the hat, the pom of the hat, and the hat brim.

STEP THREE: Apply glue around where Santa’s beard, mustache, and hair will be. You can also use contact paper as another option as noted below.

STEP FOUR: Put cotton balls all on top of the glue leaving space for the two eyes.

STEP FIVE: Place the googly eyes in the open space and cut a small circle in the red paper for the nose and sneak it right under the eyes.

Finished Santa Claus Cotton Ball Craft

How to Complete This Craft Easily With a 2-Year-Old

While this craft is easy as is, there are some hacks to making it even simpler when working with a 2-year-old.

  • Cut out all the pieces ahead of time. Toddlers have a very short attention span so it’s important to prep everything for them. Otherwise, they’ll get bored before you even start.
  • Use contact paper instead of glue. If your toddler loves to stick their fingers in glue and eat it (I have one of those toddlers too), cut the contact paper to fit Santa’s mustache and beard.

    Glue it down with the sticky side up and let your child place the cotton balls on the sticky side!
  • Put a plastic tablecloth down on the table under the craft. This works great for all arts and crafts for toddlers. I can usually reuse my tablecloth for a good year before needing a new one!
  • Let them mess up. It’s so easy to correct our child when they didn’t put the hat where you think it should go. Let them make their own mistakes. The smile your child gives you when it’s done will be worth it.
Finished toddler Santa Claus craft with cotton balls

How to Make This Santa Project More Challenging for Preschoolers and Older Kids

  • Let your children cut and trace the templates. If they’re just learning how to use scissors, leave just one or two easy pieces for them to cut out.
  • Let them apply the glue on their own. Liquid glue will work best to attach the cotton balls, so allow them to place the glue where needed.

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Collage of Santa Template and finished Santa project

DOWNLOAD THE FREE TEMPLATE HERE!

Having issues viewing the template? Click here to have the PDF download automatically.

Santa Claus craft with cotton balls

Santa Claus Cotton Ball Craft

Yield: 1 Santa Craft
Prep Time: 5 minutes
Active Time: 10 minutes
Total Time: 15 minutes
Difficulty: Easy

A quick and easy Santa Claus craft with cotton balls designed for toddlers.

Materials

  • Santa template
  • Construction paper or card stock in blue, red, white, and tan/cream/brown
  • Cotton balls
  • Googly eyes

Tools

  • Glue or contact paper
  • Scissors

Instructions

  1. Cut out the template pieces.* You can either print them out directly to the
    colored paper if your printer allows or cut them out and trace them onto
    the colored paper.
  2. Glue the body on the bottom of the blue paper. Glue the circle (his face) on
    top of the body along with the hat, the pom of the hat, and the hat
    brim.
  3. Apply glue around where Santa’s beard, mustache, and hair will be. You can
    also use contact paper instead of glue.
  4. Put cotton balls all on top of the glue leaving space for the two eyes.
  5. Place the googly eyes in the open space and cut a small circle in the red paper for the nose and sneak it right under the eyes.

Notes

Colors of cardstock paper and what they will be used for:

  • The hat and body will be red
  • The large circle (his face) will be tan/cream/brown
  • The hat brim and pom of the hat will be white
  • The blue paper will stay untouched for the background of the project

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