An Adorable and Easy Bee Craft to Make with Kids

Looking for a fun craft to do with kids on a lazy afternoon? Here's an idea for an adorable bee craft that even little kids can help make. With just a few basic materials, you can create these cute busy bees in no time flat. Make a bunch and stick them to windows, put them in flower pots or tape them to walls—wherever you want a little cheery bee to add some color and fun!

First, gather all the materials you'll need for this project. Doing this makes the process much more efficient, and prevents last-minute scrambling to find something you need, only to discover that you don't have it. It's a great way to teach kids how to plan and be organized, which can carry over into other things they have to do, like homework or chores. Here's what you'll need to make these cute bees:

• Paper (yellow, black–and if you want to add a pop of color to the antennae–red)
• Circle-shaped paper punches (For this project, we used two sizes: 2" and 1 1/2") Tip: If you don't have circle paper punches, you can just use the bottoms of drinking glasses or bottles in two sizes to make circles; just trace it onto the paper and cut around to make your circles.
• Small flower or heart-shaped punch (for antennae toppers)
• Black marker
• Craft sticks
• Glue dots

Note: If you want to add wings, use a 1" circle paper punch or small bottle to make a circle out of tracing paper or vellum paper—something that's see-through—to make little circles for the wings.

Start making your bees by creating the bodies. Take your yellow paper and punch out large and medium-sized circles.

Make the head and body of the bees by gluing the medium-sized circles to the larger circles as shown.

Next, using a paper cutter or scissors, make thin strips with the black paper. If you don't have a paper cutter, just make straight lines with a ruler and cut along the lines to make the strips. Each strip should be thin, about 1/4" wide.

Glue stripes to the body of the bees using the black strips of paper, as shown. For each bee, use two or three strips of paper.

Cut off excess strips of black paper to make them fit the bee bodies (Tip: don't throw away the excess strips, save them for the next step). Then, take the black marker and draw on the eyes and mouth to make the faces for each bee.

Cut the black strips of paper into shorter pieces and glue them to the backs of the heads of each bee to make the antennae.

Add a pop of color and fun touch to the bee antennae with a small heart- or flower-shaped paper punch. You can leave it plain, but adding these little touches at the end of each antenna makes the bees much cuter—even more than they already are!

Glue on the antennae toppers to the front of each antenna, as shown.

These stingers are cute and safe, unlike the real thing! Using the black paper, cut out small triangles. Then, glue them to the bodies of the bees. If you want to put the bees into planters around the house or use them as puppets, glue craft sticks to the back of each bee.

While the bees are adorable just as they are without the wings, you may want to add them for extra detail. Use a small circle punch, about 1" in diameter (or a small bottle that you can use to trace and cut your circles) and glue the wings onto the bodies of the bees. Put one wing on the front and one on the back.

Once you have a batch of finished bees, put them all around the house–in your flower pots, on your fridge, anywhere they fit!

Take out some books from the library or go online for some info about bees and how important they are to our planet and crops; learn together with your kids how they contribute to our lives every day, including, of course, honey.