When school is out and the weather is hot, the extra time leaves a child with nothing to do and boredom can set in very quickly. Making summer crafts would, keep a child occupied, be fun and be a learning experience as well.

One simple craft idea is to take the children out and let them search for objects outdoors, like grasses and seeds. Help them make collages with cardboard paper as the backing. Use glitter or silver or gold spray to decorate their pieces and glue them on to the paper. The child may use the wild flowers and grasses and arrange them, making a bouquet for a vase. An even better idea is to make a homemade vase to arrange the flowers in.

To make a vase, take a soup can that has its jagged edges smoothed down, cut colored construction paper to fit the can. Let the children decorate the paper as they wish. They could write their names using glitter or letters or even beans and seeds. Or they could draw a picture with a summer theme. Let the glue dry. After it has dried, glue the decorated paper around the soup can and let it dry again.

Use the vase for fresh flowers too if you like. The decorated soup may be used to collect pens and pencils or anything they wish to keep in a special place. Try making a vase out of other containers, like jars for instance. You may use canning jars but it is much more fun to take old pickle jars or mayonnaise jars or even other kinds made of glass or plastic and clean them out. Since the weather is hot, let the children have fun splashing about with the water, washing the jars. After they are dry, the children can use beans and seeds again or even glitter to decorate the jars. Or they may simply tie a ribbon around the neck.

Crafts in summer time keep the children from being bored and produce decorations for your home that mean something to your family.

About the Author: Beverly Kane is a staff writer at http://www.kids-digest.com and is an occasional contributor to several other websites, including http://www.theshoppinggazette.com.