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DLTK's Holiday Activities for Kids
You Are My Sunshine Craft

I've had a lot of positive response from people about this craft.  Although it was originally made for mother's day, here are some alternate ideas I received from people who used the site:
  

 You are my sunshine craft
bulletFather's Day gift
bulletgift from a sibling to a new baby (do it in front of the grandparents/family and have plenty of kleenex available!)
bulletkindergarten graduation gift from children to their parents (at an assembly or graduation tea)
bulletgift from children to their teacher when the school year is over or when a teacher retires or leaves the school (have the teacher be the sun and all the children be the flowers... make a single collage/card)
bulletChris suggested this neat variation:  Instead of magnets, paste the sun with photo on the top of a piece of blue construction paper, then use pieces of green construction paper to make grass and a stem and leaves for the flower. Then write the you are my sunshine verse on the paper.  It turns out very nice.

The depressing thing about Mother's Day crafts is that I likely won't get the ones I design and I really want my kids to think up something like this one for me!  Although meant to be a fridge magnet, if you don't have magnet backings, don't worry about it too much.  Use the craft for a card, make a collage/picture from it or just as individual pictures to hang up.  I'm sure mom will love it no matter how the kids present it!

MATERIALS NEEDED:

bulletPrinter
bulletPaper
bulletScissors
bulletSomething to colour with
bulletMagnet backing
bulletA photograph or hand drawn picture of mom's face and a photograph or hand drawn picture of the child's face that will fit inside the circle of the flower and the circle of the sun.
bulletTo make the craft sturdier, you can paste the paper template onto a piece of poster board or cardboard before cutting it out.  (Whenever I need poster board, I usually use the cardboard that comes out of nylon stocking packages)

INSTRUCTIONS:

bulletPrint out the template of choice.  Glue the template onto poster board or cardboard if you wish to make the craft sturdier.
bulletColour (where appropriate) and cut out the template pieces.  Younger kids may need help with this.
bulletCut the picture of mom and picture of child out in a circle shape to fit inside the sunflower and the sun.
bulletPaste mom's picture into the sunshine and the child's picture into the sunflower.
bulletAttach the magnet to the back (most of the magnets from the craft store come with a sticky backing, but if you have one that doesn't use a glue gun to attach)
bulletWhen printing the template, make sure to set all your margins to zero so that the page prints properly.
bulletIf you are using the black and white template, print it on yellow coloured construction paper as an alternative to colouring it in.
bulletFeel free to decorate further with sparkles, sparkle glue, sequins or anything else the kids can think of.
bullet

When the children give mom her gift, make sure they sing!

WORDS TO 
"YOU ARE MY SUNSHINE"
 PLAY MUSIC

You are my sunshine
My only sunshine
You make me happy
When skies are grey
You never know dear
How much I love you
So please don't take my sunshine away!

(substitute the word Mom or Grandma for the word DEAR in the third last line)

There are more words to the song, but this is a good length for younger children.

 

bulletClose the template window after printing to return to this screen. 
   
bulletSet page margins to zero if you have trouble fitting the template on one page (FILE, PAGE SETUP in most browsers). 
 

Template for   (color)   or   (B&W)

  

Printable version of these instructions