Snowmen Galore

Bowling Pin Snowman…totally cute!

…I thought I'd share with you what we did in class this year for out parent gifts.  I've been making these cutie patooties for well over 14 years and they are a hit.  Keep this in mind for next year because it's worth the effort!

This year we made well over 60 snowmen because we included our 3rd grade buddy class.  …can you imaging 200+ cotton balls per snowman…holy guacamole batman!!  Believe it or not, the kids did a fantastic job!  They were neat and didn't even get glue up to their elbows as I expected.  They followed directions and loved every minute of it.  Here's the how to and the materials needed:

-one bowling pin per student

-200-300 cotton balls per student (they come in bags of 100, 200 & 300)

-LOTS of white glue

-one scarf per student (cut from fleece)

-one sock per student (tied and cut at the top…don't forget to shake it out to remove extra lint)

-one orange nose (made from 1/3 length of reg. pipe cleaner)

-one black mouth (made from 1/2 length of reg. pipe cleaner)

-3 jingle bells per student

-2 goggly eyes per student

1)  Get a parent volunteer to scout around to your local bowling alley and ask for any donations of their old pins.  Some years we have had to pay $1.00 a pin but his year, our volunteer hit the timing just right since they were switching out old pins for new pins and got over 100 pins donated for FREE!!!!!  

This is only half…the remaining half is in our buddy room.

2)  Have students bring in 200+ cotton balls and store them until your ready for the big gluing day(s).  We did this over a two week period.  The first time we just got started and the second meeting, we met for an hour to finish all the gluing.

3) As you have your kids begin gluing, make sure that they start at the bottom and glue one row at a time.  I gave the kids a paper plate with a puddle of glue to share…then dip and glue, dip and glue, etc...

First day results

Second day results…a week later

The (un)finished snowman…200+ cotton balls :)

4)  Now is the fun part.  I went out and purchased (each kiddo donated $1.00 - $2.00) about 2 1/2 yards of wintery fleece (cut into 2 1/2 strips), jingle bells (3 each), black & orange pipe cleaners, and lots of large googly eyes.  We pre-made the mouths, hats (made from a "no-show sock-tied and cut at the top) and the noses (cut an orange pipe cleaner into 1/3 and then wrap it around the pointy end of a pencil…this makes the perfect spiral nose).  Remember to show the kids one thing/detail to glue at a time.  We started with the hat & scarf then moved on to the mouth, jingle bells, and eyes.  We placed the nose on last and then let our snowmen take a nap while we went to lunch.  Adorable!!!

Don't they look so cute? 

5)  Finally, the last thing to do is wrap them up so your kiddos can put them under their trees...but this year, to save time…Boomer our Elf got a little busy!  If you could have seen their faces when they walked in to our room the last day -priceless!  We found Boomer wrapped up a little as well.  Thanks Boomer!  

I really think you would love making these with your kiddos next year or even in January to celebrate Winter.  :)