Do your kids enjoy decorating gingerbread houses? Do they wish they could build and decorate gingerbread houses all day long over and over? Do you have an empty cereal box on-hand?? Here’s a little DIY toy project to try!
First, you will need to download and print out our free gingerbread house template. Each cereal box provides enough cardboard to make one gingerbread house. Trace the template onto the inside of an empty cereal box, cut it out, and fold along the indicated lines. For the roof, you will need half of a cereal box side that is folded in half.
If your kids enjoy building and decorating over and over, you can add bits of self-adhesive Velcro® — the hook side is perfect for adding pom-poms, or felt pieces! I even used the Velcro to hold the house together, so it could be taken apart later.
It should look something like this:
Then, it’s time to play!! Invite your child over to build the gingerbread house, and decorate it with pom-poms, or felt pieces for doors and windows! Pipe cleaners made great candy canes, but needed a bit of fuzzy Velcro added so they would stick.
Mmmm… looks almost good enough to eat!
I love how Clara enjoyed decorating her gingerbread house, and even cut out her own little pieces of felt for decorations! When she was all done, the entire thing can be taken apart and laid flat for easy storage. We kept all of the decorations in an empty egg carton.
Fun, festive, and very frugal!
Have fun!!