[pinit]
When I told the girls about the Tinkerlab paper bag challenge they knew exactly what they wanted to make: paper bag monsters.
Every two months tinkerlab lays down a challenge to children inviting them to take an ordinary material and turn it into something creative. This month it’s all about paper bags. Further down this post you can see all the wonderful ideas other bloggers have some up with – click through on each link to see how they made them – and you can join in too and add your own link.
First though, here’s how the girls came up with their paper bag monsters.
How to make a paper bag monster
First up: locate your paper bag – surprisingly tricky in the UK! (N.B. Jo Malone. How posh are we? Don’t let anyone know we were only given it as a recycled carrier when we bought something from a charity shop.) B immediately focused on the handles and how they would be just the thing for attaching the bag to your body: perfect arm holes.
Next step: decoration. The collage was created from bits and pieces located in our making box, so all recycled. 
Cut out a big, wide mouth from the front of your paper bag monster…
and check that you’ll be able to see where you’re going.
Customise with added extras such as pipe cleaner antennae.
L chose the softest materials she could find and transformed them into something terrifying: cotton wool fur and tail, doily wings, fluffy pom pom feelers.
Hello Kitty never looked so scary.
Thanks for the inspiration Tinkerlab – we had so much fun making our paper bag monsters!
More paper bag craft ideas
You can find full details here – and there’s a competition with fun prizes so get making and add your own link.
happily shared with it’s playtime
haha, I love their take on it & that Hello Kitty bag was quite scary looking! Fabulous job, well done to both girls!
Love the doily wings and pipe cleaner antennae!! Great idea:)
The monsters are really cool! They look like they had a lot of fun! Why are paper bags so difficult to find? We can always buy a whole pack of paper bag lunch bags in our local grocery store, but larger ones are more difficult to find.
soooo scary, Cathy! haha! I love how your daughter transformed this bag. and props to you for making the most of your ONE bag. and more props to the UK for saving so many trees!
Your girls are so creative! I just love how they did all the creating themselves.
I think I might be scared on a dark, spooky night. =)
Just curious – do folks in the UK carry around canvas shopping bags or something else?
Well I think pretty much every shop would offer plastic bags not paper ones. Except super posh shops like Jo Malone lol! More and more people are using canvass bags or extra strong plastic ‘bags for life’ and some shops don’t give out bags anymore or charge you for them. I guess there has been a campaign in the UK to reduce the number of one-use-only bags. I’ve never seen paper lunch bags for sale either. School children all have a plastic picnic-style lunch bag which they use / wash out / use again. You can buy paper gift bags though, so I guess I could always have got one of those – we just love junk crafting too much!
so fun and creative!
That is so fun!!! I love those “scary” monsters. And I love art that is useful for pretend play. HOORAY for creative kids!