23 January Crafts That Fill the Empty Week After Christmas for Free

The post 23 January Crafts That Fill the Empty Week After Christmas for Free appeared first on Penny Pinchin' Mom.

Once the tree comes down and the boxes go back up to the attic, you’re staring at seven empty days before school starts again, bored kids in a house that has gone too quiet. I used to panic-buy activity kits every January until I realized my recycling bin and leftover wrapping paper could keep my grandkids busy for hours.

This list gives you 23 January crafts for kids that fill that dead week without spending much. A Goal Jar turns the new year into something they can decorate. A Family Time Capsule gets sealed in the first week of January and becomes a project they’ll beg to open next December.

New Year Crafts to Kick Off a Fresh Start

1. Goal Jar

A clean spaghetti sauce or jelly jar, rinsed and de-labeled, is all this starts with. Kids ages 5 to 10 write one hope for the year on each paper strip, fold it, and drop it in. Younger kids can dictate while you write.

All you need is one glass jar, scrap paper cut into strips, markers, and whatever you have for decorating. If you want stickers or ribbon, a pack at Dollar Tree is a dollar, so the whole thing lands between free and about $3.

Give it 20 minutes, and set the jar somewhere visible, like a kitchen windowsill. The magic is in opening it next December, so write the date on the lid in permanent marker before it gets shoved in a cabinet.

2. Family Time Capsule

This is the craft that pays you back a year later. A shoebox becomes the container, and everyone ages 4 to 12 adds a letter to their future self, a drawing, a movie ticket, a school photo, a scrap of something from the holidays.

Back when my kids were little, we sealed one of these on New Year’s Day, and I genuinely forgot about it until the following winter. Watching them read their own handwriting from a year earlier bought me a solid hour of quiet.

Materials: shoebox, packing tape, paper, markers, and a permanent marker for the open-on date. Dollar Tree decorating supplies are a dollar each if you want them, so figure $0 to $5. Plan on 30 minutes.

3. Year-in-Review Memory Page

Kids ages 6 to 12 who like sorting and gluing will stay with this one the longest. The setup is 12 sheets of printer paper, one per month, and each page gets a photo or a drawing plus a few sentences about what happened.

Materials: printer paper, a glue stick, markers, and photos if you have them. The Walmart photo kiosk prints them at 12 cents each, so a full set of a dozen costs under $2. Skip the photos entirely and let them draw, and the project is free.

Budget 45 minutes, longer if they get chatty about the memories. Punch three holes down the side, and it slides right into a binder.

4. DIY Wall Calendar

Store-bought kids’ calendars run $10 to $20, and a homemade one keeps them busy for a solid 40 minutes instead of ten seconds. Ages 5 to 11 can handle this, though the youngest will need you to draw the grids.

Materials: 12 sheets of paper or cardstock, a ruler, markers or crayons, a hole punch, and yarn or ribbon to bind the top. Cardstock at Walmart is about $5 for a big pack and lasts through years of projects, so the real cost sits between nothing and $5.

Have them illustrate the top half of each page and fill in birthdays and holidays on the grid. It turns into a reference they actually use.

5. Resolution Countdown Paper Chain

For the youngest crafters in the house, ages 3 to 8, this one hits the sweet spot of easy and satisfying. Pick a small, real goal like reading 20 books or drinking water instead of juice for two weeks, then make one paper link per day out of construction paper strips, tape or staples, and markers. A pack of construction paper at Dollar Tree is $1.50, and most houses still have some left from school projects, so call it $0 to $2.

Twenty minutes gets the chain built. Hang it in a doorway and let them tear off one link a day, which is the part that keeps them coming back to it.

6. New Year Noisemaker Shakers

Two paper plates and a handful of dried beans make a shaker loud enough to ring in a fresh year, even if you are doing it at 3 in the afternoon on January 4th. Ages 3 to 8, and the noise level is the whole appeal. Each shaker takes two paper plates, about a tablespoon of dried beans or rice, a stapler, and markers or paint. A stack of paper plates is a dollar at Dollar Tree, and the beans come out of the pantry, so figure $0 to $3 for the batch.

Staple the plates face to face all the way around before they decorate, or you will be picking beans out of the rug.

7. Word of the Year Banner

My grandkids picked “brave” and “silly” for their words last winter, and honestly, both held up all year. Kids ages 6 to 12 choose one word to aim for, then build a small banner spelling it out.

Materials: cardstock or construction paper cut into triangles, markers, a hole punch, and yarn or string. Everything is likely in the house already, and cardstock is $4 a pack at Michaels or Walmart if you need it. Call it $0 to $4.

Thirty minutes, start to finish. One letter per triangle, strung across a bedroom doorway, and it stays up long after the January crafts pile has been recycled.

8. How I’ve Grown This Year Page

Tape a long sheet of paper to the wall, and this becomes a keeper instead of a craft. Kids ages 3 to 10 trace a hand, record their height, and write or dictate three things they learned to do in the past year.

Butcher paper or four sheets of printer paper taped together, a pencil, a tape measure, and washable paint if you want a real handprint. Dollar Tree craft paint is $1.25 a bottle, so the cost sits between free and about $3. Plan on 25 minutes with a little drying time. Date it, then do the same page next January and compare the two side by side.

What to Make With Your Leftover Wrapping Paper, Boxes, and Ribbon

9. Wrapping Paper Collage Art

Before those wrapping paper scraps go out with the trash bags, flatten the biggest pieces and set them aside with a glue stick. This one costs $0, since every material comes from the floor around the tree on Christmas morning.

Ages 3 to 10. You need leftover wrapping paper, safety scissors, a glue stick, and a sturdy backing like cardstock or the flattened side of a cereal box. Plan on about 20 minutes.

Older kids can cut shapes and layer them into a real scene, a snowy scene, a self-portrait, or an animal. Preschoolers do better tearing the paper into pieces and gluing them down in patches, which is honestly the prettier result anyway.

Metallic and glitter papers give the finished piece a stained-glass look no craft store paper can match.

10. Cardboard Box Playhouse or Castle

Big appliance boxes always outlast every toy that came inside them, and this is the project that puts them to good use instead of the recycling bin.

Ages 3 to 10, though older kids will run the construction and let the little ones move in. Gather two or three large boxes, packing tape, a box cutter for adult use only, and markers or craft paint. A two-pack of Dollar Tree acrylic paint is $2.50 if you want color, but crayons work fine.

Budget 60 minutes or more, and expect it to stretch across two days once they start adding rooms.

Cut the door and window openings yourself, then hand it over. The decorating is the part that eats the afternoon.

11. Ribbon Bookmarks and Friendship Bracelets

Three lengths of leftover curling ribbon or satin ribbon, each about 24 inches, braid into a bracelet or a book marker in roughly 25 minutes. Cost is $0 if you saved the ribbon off packages, which most of us do without meaning to.

Ages 6 to 12. Younger than six, the braiding gets frustrating and the ribbon slips. Tape the knotted end to the edge of the kitchen table so it stays anchored while they work, or clip it to a clipboard.

Satin and grosgrain ribbon hold a braid better than the thin curling kind, so sort those out first. Finish bracelets with a simple square knot and bookmarks with a knot at each end.

12. Leftover Christmas Card Puzzle

This one buys you fifteen quiet minutes and uses cards that were headed for recycling anyway. $0, start to finish.

Ages 4 to 9. Cut the front panel off each Christmas card, then cut that panel into puzzle pieces with scissors. Six large pieces for a four-year-old, ten to twelve wavy pieces for an eight- or nine-year-old who wants a challenge.

Make five or six puzzles at once and store each one in its own sandwich bag so the pieces don’t mingle into an unsolvable mess.

Cards with a busy scene work better than cards with a single big image, since the details give younger kids something to match. The homemade photo cards from family are the ones they’ll ask for twice.

13. Bow and Ribbon Wreath

If you saved the stick-on bows off packages, you already have most of this craft sitting in a grocery sack. Cut the center out of a paper plate to make a ring, then cover the ring with bows and looped ribbon.

Ages 6 to 12, about 30 minutes. Materials are one paper plate per child, leftover bows and ribbon, and either double-sided tape or a low-temp glue gun. Cost lands at $0 to $3, since paper plates are a dollar a pack at Dollar Tree and most of us have plates left from the holiday.

If you use hot glue, stay at the table with them. A low-temp gun and adult hands on the trigger keep it simple.

Hang it on a bedroom door, and it carries the house through January.

14. Tissue Paper Stained Glass Window Clings

Sunlight through colored tissue paper looks far more expensive than it is, and every gift bag in the house is stuffed with the stuff.

Ages 4 to 10. You need leftover tissue paper torn into small pieces, two sheets of clear contact paper, scissors, and tape. A roll of contact paper is $4 at Walmart, and Dollar Tree’s clear shelf liner works the same way for $1.50. One roll makes a dozen of these.

Time is about 25 minutes.

Tape one sheet of contact paper sticky side up to the table, let kids press tissue pieces onto it, then seal it with the second sheet on top. Trim into hearts, stars, or snowflake shapes and press them straight onto a sunny window.

Snow, Ice, and Hibernation Crafts for a Cold Week

15. Salt Painting Snow Scene

Kids stop and stare when the watercolor hits the salt and travels along the glue lines by itself. Draw a simple winter scene on dark blue or black cardstock with white school glue (hills, a snowman outline, bare trees), pour table salt over the wet glue, then tip the excess off. Touch a loaded paintbrush to the raised salt lines and the color creeps outward on its own.

Ages 4 to 9, about 30 minutes plus an hour of drying. Salt is $1 at Walmart, and a basic watercolor pan set is $1.25 at Dollar Tree, so you’re at $2 to $5 unless both are already in the cabinet.

Work over a rimmed baking sheet. The loose salt pours right back into the box, and your table stays clean. We skipped that step the first winter we tried it, and I was finding salt in the seams of my kitchen chairs until March.

16. Coffee Filter Snowflakes

When you need one craft that a three-year-old and an eight-year-old can both do at the same table, this is it. Flatten basket-style coffee filters, fold them into eighths, and let kids snip shapes along the folds. Open them up, color with washable markers, then spritz lightly with water from a spray bottle so the colors bleed and blur.

Ages 3 to 8, about 20 minutes plus drying time on a towel. A 100-count pack of filters is $2 at Walmart or Dollar Tree and will outlast the entire week. For the youngest kids, pre-fold the filters yourself and hand them over with safety scissors. Tape the dry ones to a window in a cluster and the whole pane looks intentional.

17. Ice Ornament Suncatchers

Fifteen minutes of setup and a freezer gets you an outdoor decoration that costs nothing. Fill a disposable pie pan or a plastic container lid with about half an inch of water, drop in cranberries, evergreen clippings from the tree you just hauled out, pinecone bits, or a few leftover bows. Lay a loop of leftover Christmas ribbon in the water with both ends submerged and the loop hanging over the edge.

Ages 5 to 11. Four to six hours in the freezer, or overnight on the back porch if it’s cold enough. $0, assuming you have water and holiday scraps.

My grandkids hung theirs on the deck railing last January and checked on them every morning until they finally melted. The countdown became half the fun.

18. Paper Bag Bear Cave Diorama

A brown paper lunch bag turns into a cave with almost no effort. Roll the top third of the bag down into a thick cuff, then cut an arched opening in the front for the cave mouth. Kids draw and cut a small bear to tuck inside, add torn white paper or cotton for snow on top, and crumple the bag slightly so it sits like a rock.

Ages 5 to 10, about 40 minutes start to finish. Fifty lunch bags are $2 at Walmart, construction paper is a dollar at Dollar Tree, so figure $0 to $3.

This one holds the older end of that age range because there’s cutting, layering, and a little storytelling built in. Ask what the bear is dreaming about, and you’ll buy yourself another ten minutes.

19. Paper Plate Hedgehog

I didn’t think a paper plate could look much like a hedgehog until my granddaughter fringed one. Cut a plain paper plate in half, then snip a row of shallow cuts all along the curved edge to make spines. Paint or crayon the spines brown, glue a triangle snout of tan construction paper on the flat end, and finish with a googly eye and a black paper nose.

Ages 3 to 7, about 25 minutes. A big stack of paper plates is a dollar at Dollar Tree, and a bag of assorted googly eyes is the same, putting this at $0 to $3 if you’re buying anything at all.

The fringing is the whole appeal for little hands. Give them a second plate so they can make a baby hedgehog too.

20. Cotton Ball Polar Animal Craft

Preschoolers go all in on this one because it’s mostly gluing and no precision required. Draw or print a chunky polar bear or arctic fox outline on blue construction paper, then let kids pull cotton balls apart and press the wisps onto small puddles of white glue. Add a black marker nose and eyes at the end.

Ages 3 to 8, about 20 minutes plus drying. A bag of 200 cotton balls is $2 at Dollar Tree or Walmart, and you’ll use maybe 15 per animal, so $1 to $2 covers a whole afternoon.

Stretching the cotton before gluing makes the fur look real instead of lumpy. Use white glue, not a glue stick, or nothing will hold.

21. Toilet Paper Roll Penguin

Empty tubes pile up all December, and here’s where they earn their keep. Paint the tube black, let it dry, then paint a white oval on the front for the belly. Cut a small orange triangle beak and two orange webbed feet from construction paper, glue them on, and add googly eyes or two paper circles with black dots.

Ages 4 to 9, about 20 minutes of work with 30 minutes of drying between coats. Dollar Tree craft paint is $1.25 a bottle and orange construction paper is the same, but most houses already have both, which makes this a $0 craft more often than not.

Make four or five and stand them on a windowsill together. A single penguin looks like homework; a colony looks like a display.

22. Egg Carton Snowy Owl

When someone wants one more animal, and you’re out of tubes, cut into the egg carton. Snip out two connected cups for the body, clip the top corners into small pointed ear tufts, and paint the whole thing white or pale gray. Two paper circles with black centers become enormous owl eyes, and a small orange triangle makes the beak.

Ages 4 to 10, about 25 minutes plus drying. Cardboard cartons are already in your recycling, and white craft paint is $1.50 at Dollar Tree, so this lands at $0 to $2.

Cardboard soaks up paint and dries stiff. Styrofoam won’t hold it at all, so save the gray cartons from the egg aisle for this one.

Martin Luther King Jr. Day Crafts for Kids

23. Handprint Peace Dove

Fifteen minutes and one sheet of white cardstock gets you a dove that even a three-year-old can pull off. Trace your child’s hand with fingers spread, cut it out, then turn it sideways so the fingers become feathers and finish with a small paper body and beak, a black dot eye, and a green paper olive branch clipped in.

Ages 3 to 8 work best, since the tracing is the hard part and an adult can handle that for the younger end. White cardstock or a paper plate, pencil, scissors, black marker, green scrap paper, glue stick. Cost runs $0 to $2 if you need white craft paint, $1.50 a bottle at Dollar Tree. Tape a few to a window, and the whole thing reads as decor instead of a craft you have to find a place for.

Boredom Solved Until School Bells Ring

That quiet house after the decorations disappear doesn’t have to stay quiet, and those seven empty days don’t have to feel so long. You already have everything you need sitting in your recycling bin and craft closet, so there’s no reason to panic-buy anything to get through this week.

Pick whichever one matches your energy level today. You’ve got this, and so do they.

The post 23 January Crafts That Fill the Empty Week After Christmas for Free appeared first on Penny Pinchin' Mom.