A fun, easy feelings activity for kids: making DIY toilet paper roll emotion buddies! Perfect for helping kids talk about their feelings.
Feelings and emotions are hard things for adults to understand and control, so it's no surprise kids need a lot of practice too.
What better way to learn how to talk about their feelings than by making a fun craft and letting them play as they practice?
Here is a simple kids' craft using the craft supply every home has in abundance: empty toilet paper rolls! (Toilet paper rolls can make gorgeous cardboard flowers, a beautiful toilet paper flower garland, a toilet paper roll tassel garland and even fun toilet paper animals too!)
All you need are some toilet paper tubes, googly eyes, and a sharpie and you're ready to make some easy Emotion Buddies!
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Why You'll Love This Craft
- Kids need a lot of help learning about their emotions and how to explain what they are feeling. Play is a fantastic way to help them explore emotions in a safe and fun way.
- This is an easy kids' craft - it's safe and simple for kids of all ages to make!
- We love crafts that use recyclable materials and this one uses a household staple that often ends up in the garbage! That makes it a win-win!
Craft Supplies Needed
- Toilet Paper Rolls - The cardboard tubes inside rolls of toilet paper and paper towels are a crafters treasure. Save them and put them to good use!
- Googly Eyes - There's no way you can look at googly eyes and not laugh. That's part of the charm of these emotion buddies!
- Sharpie - To draw on the face. You can also use a washable kids' marker too.
- Glue Stick - For securing the googly eyes onto the cardboard tubes.
- (Optional) Felt Balls - For ears if you want to add them. (I used the felt balls to make quirky toilet paper roll animals; not for these Emotion Buddies.)
DIY Toilet Paper Roll Emotion Buddies | Feelings Activities for Kids
Step 1. Use a glue stick and glue googly eyes to each of your recycled toilet paper rolls.
You can make this step even easier if you buy googly eyes that already have adhesive on the back like these ones.
Step 2. Using a Sharpie (or children's marker,) draw faces on each of the toilet paper rolls.
I made three different Emotion Buddies: Sad, Happy, and Mad.
It's funny how simply drawing eyebrows and mouths onto the toilet paper tubes can convey such strong feelings!
Step 3. Let your kids learn about their feelings as they play!
That's all there is to this simple toilet paper roll craft!
My son immediately began playing with his little feeling friends, pretending they were characters from Daniel Tiger (his current favorite.)
Common Questions
Yes, you definitely can use the cardboard tubes from inside rolls of paper towels! They are longer than toilet paper tubes, so you will want to cut them in half. You also want to make sure to cut the bottom evenly so they can stand up on their own.
If the googly eyes aren't staying on the cardboard tubes with either the self-adhesive that may have come on the back of the googly eyes, or glue sticks, you might have to use a stronger glue to make them stick. You can hot glue the googly eyes on the cardboard for the strongest hold.
Our three emotion buddies we made here are Happy, Sad, and Mad. You can explore other emotions like Surprised, Confused, Scared, Frustrated, Excited, and Nervous, just to name a few. It might be tricky to convey more complex emotions using just eyebrow and mouth shapes, but you'd be surprised how many emotions you can create for the buddies!
Not only are these Emotion Buddies super easy and so cute, but kids love them.
And while they play, they are familiarizing themselves with the basic emotions, and learning about feelings.
Pretty soon, you'll be attempting to add more feelings... Frustrated, surprised, and scared next, perhaps??
More Recycled Crafts You'll Love
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DIY Toilet Paper Roll Emotion Buddies | Feelings Activities for Kids
Materials
- Toilet Paper Tubes
- Googly Eyes
- Sharpie
- Glue Stick
Instructions
- Use a glue stick and glue googly eyes to each of your recycled toilet paper rolls.You can make this step even easier if you buy googly eyes that already have adhesive on the back like these ones.
- Using a Sharpie (or children's marker,) draw faces on each of the toilet paper rolls.I made three different Emotion Buddies: Sad, Happy, and Mad.It's funny how simply drawing eyebrows and mouths onto the toilet paper tubes can convey such strong feelings!
- Let your kids learn about their feelings as they play!That's all there is to this simple toilet paper roll craft!
Notes
- You can use the cardboard tubes inside paper towels and toilet paper. If you use the tubes from paper towels, you can cut them in half since they are longer.
- Make sure the bottom of each cardboard tube is flat so the emotion buddy will stand up by itself.
- If the googly eyes have trouble staying in place when little hands are playing with them, you can hot glue them into place for a firmer hold.
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