My Garden and Patterned Paper Plate Sunflowers

Planting and Gardening Week

Patterned Sunflowers Made Out of Old Gift Bags

I know I have already blogged about how much we love Kevin Henkes' books over here, so I will be repeating myself, but the books are just fantastic and very inspiring.  After reading My Garden by Kevin Henkes, it was, once again, my three year old who came up with our art project!

My Garden is a beautifully written and illustrated book about a little girl who loves to help out in her mother's garden, but imagines what it would be like to have a garden of her own.  As you read about her imaginary garden you will just want to jump right in!  There are chocolate bunnies, jelly bean bushes, and flowers that grow back the second they are picked.  My son loves the page that has keys, buttons, and umbrellas popping up everywhere in the garden, but he is especially fond of the sunflowers that are unique colors and patterns.

Each time we read My Garden, my three year old told me he wanted to make a blue polka dotted sunflower just like the little girl had in her garden.  He was thrilled when I told him that we were going to FINALLY make the flower.  He had to run to get the book and show me the page again.  He must have thought that I had forgotten.

I gave the boys a bunch of wrapping paper, gift bags, and some other fancy paper I had held onto forever!  We have so many gift bags that I thought it was time we put them to good use and the patterns on them were perfect for this project.  Most of the bags were so bent up we couldn't use them again, anyway.

The boys picked out their favorite patterns.  Blue stripes, polka dots, and I chose pink stripes.

While I cut out some petals for my son he practiced his cutting skills on the paper bag.

We traced the paper plate onto the paper of their choice, cut it out, and glued it on.

My three year old grabbed the camera while I drew some petals.

They glued the petals on the back.  We practiced patterns with the petals on a couple of the flowers that we made.  My three year old loved the project, but was unhappy with the glue on his hands.

I was planning on making crepe paper stems, but my kindergartner insisted on something that he could hold onto.  We used paint sticks instead and painted them to match our flowers.

Our Garden inspired by My Garden!  My three year old made 2 and helped me with mine!

Kindergartner's Sunflower

My pink striped sunflower and my three year old's polka dotted flower.

You should have seen the floor after this craft!  There was paper everywhere, but I didn't mind.  I loved that my boys were so proud of their sunflowers!  As we made them we talked about what we would grow in our garden.  My kindergartner said he would plant Nerds so that he could have a plant that grew them and he could eat them whenever he wanted.  He said it would grow all different flavored Nerds.  I think my garden would grow lattes!

Be sure to check out Little White Rabbit and Birds if you like Kevin Henkes' books!

Here are our other Planting and Gardening Books!

Jo MacDonald Had a Garden

Curious George Plants a Tree

In My Garden

Flower Garden

A Garden of Opposites

The Imaginary Garden