The Hooligans and I have had a spectacular September, crafting up all kinds of Fall goodness – apple stamping, Autumn collages, and colourful fall trees.  The weather has been incredibly warm, and I’m sad to see our last summer-like days come to an end.  I have to admit though,  it’s exciting, thinking about all the Hallowe’en crafting that October will bring!

I intended to wait until Monday to start our Spooky Crafting, but I saw this clever little weaving activity over at PlayCreateExplore, and I really wanted to try it, so, what the heck…we started our Hallowe’en crafting before September was officially over, and made these Friday.  

All you need for the web is a styrofoam meat tray and some wool.  I cut the tray into 5×5 squares (you can use a nail file to smooth the cut edges if you’re anal like me really particular).  Make small v-shaped notches all around the edges, and secure a long piece of wool to the back of the tray with a piece of tape.  Weave away, my Hooligans!

Once the webs were complete (aren’t they sweet?), we made our spiders.  I’m sure there are plenty of ways to make spiders, but we went with pom-poms and pipe cleaners.  I didn’t think glue would work very well to attach the legs, so I pushed a pipe cleaner through the pom-pom and cut it off at the desired length.  Voila: 2 legs.  Repeat 3 more times.  This is a little tricky and time-consuming, and definitely not something the Hooligans could have done themselves, so while I was attaching legs, I set them up with some scissors and the left-over meat tray pieces, and they snipped those all up into little bits for us to for some other Hallowe’en craft.  Cutting the styrofoam was really a great little activity in itself.  It make a neat sound as it’s being cut.  Once done, they used their fingers to break the pieces up even smaller, and this too, makes a very satisfying little “snap”.

Once I had the legs assembled, all that was left to do was to glue on some googly eyes! 

Now, just place a spider on his web, and nestle a couple of his legs under some of the wool to hold him in place.

Awww, how cute is he?

What Hallowe’en crafts are you making with your kiddos?  Feel free to post your pics on our facebook page!  We’d love to see what’s brewing at your house!