Snow Cone Snowmen

The inspiration for this craft came from Oriental Trading. They have a snow cone snowman ornament craft that is flat and made out of craft foam. I thought it would be fun to make a 3D version. I was planning on using some snow cone cups that I had, but they were huge and I would have needed really big styrofoam balls to fill them. I didn't want to spend that much. So instead I opened up one of my cups to use as my template. Then I just rolled them smaller. While they were still flat, I had the kids decorate them with snowflake stamps and ink.

To make the snowmen, they took two styrofoam balls, one big and one little, and attached them together using a toothpick. Then each child picked a hat for their snowman. I brought in some of my daughter's old baby socks and cut them in two. The toe part would be a regular hat. For the ankle part, I cut strips for fringe on one end and used a rubber band to make a little poof.

They were adorable! I had cut strips of felt to make scarves, and I cut up some pipe cleaners for the noses and arms. We also used wiggle eyes and buttons and attached them with glue dots.

I set out a bunch of permanent markers for the kids to make smiles. They pushed the tip of the marker into the styrofoam a bunch of times to make little dots.

Ta-da! So cute!

Then I rolled up their snow cone wrapper to the perfect size, taped them closed, added some glue to the rim and set the snowman in it. I pushed down along the rim to make sure it would adhere to the ball. You want to make sure the ball fits snug inside, not just rest on top. I had to open up and re-roll a few because there wasn't enough of the ball for which the paper could attach. After doing that, I had to find spots around my classroom for the glue to dry while the snowmen were in an upright position. It was kind of fun seeing these guys all over.

I decided to add a drop of glue between the big and small balls, just in case. I was planning on hanging them from the ceiling so I wanted them to be secure. The scarves and hats clung to the styrofoam easily, so there was no need to glue them on. When they were dry, I hung them from the lights by sticking a paperclip right through the hat.

 Here are some close-ups of these cuties:

And of course we had to have snow cones (in little dixie cups) with our snack!

The snowflake stamps inspired me to make something else. I'll share that soon!