Thanksgiving Paint Stick Turkey Craft

This Paint Stick Turkey Craft has become an annual favorite! A fun way to keep the kids occupied while making Thanksgiving dinner. I love this Thanksgiving craft because it is a turkey craft for kids, turkey craft for preschoolers and kids of any age. The turkey and construction paper fixings are the stars of this Turkey craft.

When surveying the craft stash I seem to have collected alot of paint sticks. DIYing the house does tend to produce extras and the local hardware store is very generous with its’ paint sticks!

No stranger to popsicle stick turkey crafts in this house I thought a paint stick turkey could certainly be made, but making a Thanksgiving craft with paint sticks would be a nice change.

There is no right or wrong with this Thanksgiving decoration which is another aspect I love. The decorations can be cut out to the level of the decorator so any age works for this craft.

Materials

Paint sticks

Craft Foam Paper, multi colors

Googly Eyes

Glue

How To Make Thanksgiving Paint Stick Turkey Craft

Directions

Construct the Paint Stick Background. The background can be as wide or narrow as you choose.
Glue together each paint stick side by side. If you have never glued paint sticks or popsicle sticks side by side I have included tips below.
Let the glue on the paint sticks dry to provide a solid background. While the glue is drying start preparing the decorations for the background.
Decide if the turkey will be a “free hand” drawing or a template. This depends upon the drawing and cutting ability as well as personal preference. This is not a free hand drawing friendly house so I searched the internet for cut out templates to use. Here are a few great resources!
Search “free Thanksgiving clip art”. A few of my favorites: The Spruce and Free clip Art library.
Print out the templates.
Cut out the turkey, owls, leaves from the template.
Trace the cut outs onto the foam paper.
Decide upon an arrangement of the turkey and Thanksgiving themed items. Anything goes! The design is totally up to the crafter – artist- turkey drawer extraordinaire.
This is a good time to think about the top of the paint stick background. Paint sticks have an indentation toward the top of the stick. I found this a fun place to weave a ribbon through the indentations. The ribbon is totally optional, but if a ribbon is used the ribbon should be woven through the paint sticks and glued to the rear of the background before gluing on the turkey and Thanksgiving theme decorations.
Lay out the decorations on the background and rearrange to your liking.
Now glue all the decorations on the paint stick background.
Need googly eyes? What turkey is not complete without a set of googly eyes! Glue the googly eyes on the turkey. Foam paper and googly eyes can sometimes fight each other to make the googly eyes stick. I have included my tips and tricks through quite a few crafts using googly eyes to tame the google eyes and make the eyes stick.
Cut a small yellow triangle for the turkey beak.
Cut a small red gobble for the turkey.
Glue the gobble on first and then glue the yellow triangle on top of the gobble.
Finish decorating the Paint Stick Turkey and enjoy this cute little homemade Turkey Craft.

How To Make A Paint Stick Background

Constructing the background is an adult only activity due to the hot glue.
Lay two paint sticks side by side. The indentations on the side of the paint sticks should be at the top.
Run a line of hot glue down the length – in between- each paint stick. If you own hot glue finger protectors (love them!) then this is the craft for you.
With your finger very quickly smooth the line of glue.
Then add upon the background by repeating the above one by one gluing one paint stick to the next glue stick of the background.

7 Thanksgiving Crafts

Decorate for Fall and Thanksgiving with 7 easy Thanksgiving crafts! The turkey and Thanksgiving crafts are dollar store friendly and will brighten up the decorations with a homemade touch and the kids will love participating!