Make a Santa to decorate your home this holiday season out of a potato chip can! This potato chip Santa is an easy craft to make with kids out of felt and pom poms (or cotton balls).
If you like this Santa craft you'll love our paper cone Santa craft for kids!
This is Dallin's last year at home with me before starting kindergarten. I love that we have this time to spend together. Today we decided to make a fun Christmas craft to display in his bedroom. A potato chip can Santa!
UPATE: We used a tutorial with a template back in 2008, but as of 2020 (when I updated this post) the site no longer exists. I've refreshed this post to include directions to make a potato chip can Santa without the template. The template was only for the felt strips that were used as the trim and Santa's belt which are just skinny piece of felt, so you really don't need the template to make Santa. It's super simple to make without! You just need a few sheets of felt, cotton balls, and glue! We had everything already on hand which was an added bonus.
Tip: You can partially fill your can with dry beans or rice to make him nice and sturdy. Santa will stand up even without the extra weight, but it is a nice option.
Notes:
- We cut as we went, making sure to cut a large square for the face that covered the top ⅓ of the can, and wrapped the bottom ⅔ of the can with red felt. (These two pieces are the main pieces for Santa's body)
- Then we cut a slit into the side using a knife and inserted the arms (a popsicle stick cut in half).
- We wrapped the arms with felt and glued it into place. Then we added trim to the arms and around the can for Santa's jacket and belt!
- The hat was the trickiest part to make without a pattern, but we found that wrapping a piece of felt around the rim, gluing it into place, then overlapping the side edges until it looked like a stocking cap worked great. We glued the side edges together then added a cotton ball at the end.
Potato Chip Can Santa Craft for Kids
Potato Chip Can Santa
Equipment
- scissors
- hot glue gun
- xacto knife
Materials
- 2 red felt rectangles 8.5x11"
- felt scraps white, blue, peach, yellow
- white pom poms or cotton balls
- craft eyes
- 1 popsicle stick
- 1 tiny pink pom pom
Instructions
- Cover the top ⅓ of the can with a rectangle of peach felt. This will be Santa's face. Glue into place.
- Cover the bottom of the can with red felt. Glue into place.
- Cut a popsicle stick in half (scissors work great)
- Using the Xacto knife, cut through the red and make 2 slits in the side of the potato chip can. Slide the popsicle sticks arms into the slits.
- Wrap popsicle sticks with red felt. Glue into place. Add tiny white strips for the sleeve cuffs. Glue into place.
- Cut thin strips of white felt to create the trim for the jacket. Glue into place.
- Create a belt by cutting out a thin piece of black felt and a yellow rectangle for the buckle. Glue into place.
- Cut two oval shapes for the boots. Glue to the bottom of the chip can, sticking out a bit.
- Hat: glue a piece of red felt around the rim of the chip can. We will come back to this in a minute.
- Glue pom poms or cotton balls around the rim for the hat and beard.
- Glue craft eyes on the face. Glue on pom pom nose.
- Finishing Hat: Overlap the side edges of the felt and gather to create a hat shape. Glue as you go. Glue a pom pom or cotton ball at the end.
Angell @ Passionate and Creative Homemaking says
I featured this today on my blog
http://passionateandcreativehomemaking.blogspot.com/2012/07/day-11-christmas-in-july.html
Amy {The Idea Room} says
Such an inexpensive and creative craft for kids of all ages. Thanks for sharing!
Kaleidoscope of Colors says
This is so cute, I would like to make a mrs. claus too! The picture of Kaylee looking at it was adorable. Love it!