It’s the start of summer and that means it’s strawberry season! Strawberry shortcake, strawberry tarts, chocolate covered strawberries…mmmmm… On Saturday I went with my parents to their local farmers market and we got four flats of strawberries to turn into strawberry jam. Coincidentally, my Mum was planning a little party for her Sunday School class the next day and she asked for my help. The theme was honey and bees, focusing on verse 24 in Proverbs 16 “Kind words are like honey – sweet to the soul and healthy for the body.” So for the craft we decided to use some of those myriad strawberry baskets and make a craft out of them: a little meadow of grass and flowers for the bees to collect their pollen. The party was really lovely, and I’ll give you the details on it in a couple of weeks, but for now here are some things we did to whet your appetite: fresh buns with honey, a Bible story where two characters speak kind words (any guesses which story?), some Bee-autiful decorations and more! But for now, I hope you’ll save your little baskets and make this craft!
Supplies:
- Strawberry basket
- Artificial flowers
- Green tissue paper (cut into about 40 strips approx. 2 inches wide by 5 inches long)
- Scissors
- Printed Bible verse (see below for details on the verse picture we chose)
- Glue gun and glue
- Cute little bee (sticker or paper cut out)
- Itty bitty clothes pins
We got the majority of these supplies at the dollar store. We found a random 6-pack of bee stickers at Dollarama, but we needed 8 of them, so we printed this bee for the remaining 2 kids.
Instructions:
- Roll up your green tissue paper (two pieces at a time) and thread it through the holes. I think it’s easiest to start in the centre and work your way out. If you use only one piece of tissue paper your “grass” will just flop over. If you use more they will be harder to unroll (see the next step), so I wouldn’t try more than four pieces.
Don’t thread every hole. Leave one hole empty in-between each roll. I also didn’t put them all the way to the edge, but you could.
2. Once they’re threaded through very gently unroll and separate them.
3. Using a glue gun glue on your flowers and bee.
4. Use your itty bitty clothes pins to clip your verse to the basket or the grass. We got our verse from Jamie Loves Letters who you can find on Etsy. I just thought it was the perfect little picture. The words are easy for beginner readers to read, it’s simple but really sweet (pun intended). Jamie has several beautiful water colours you can purchase. If you’d like to check out Jamie’s Etsy shop just click here.
Here are some happy kids with their finished crafts:
Can you think of other uses for strawberry baskets? What do you think of this craft? I’d love to hear from you in the comments below! If you’re looking for more upcycle crafts take a look at Clementine Box Doll Bed and DIY Snake Nest. If you’re looking for a summer snack craft to have with this you should try Watermelon Happy Faces. Happy Canada Day!
But First We Craft 
2 thoughts on “Meadow Craft”