
Doing crafts with kids is a great way to celebrate the Chinese New Year, also known as the Spring Festival. This is an ancient celebration that marks the end of the winter season and the beginning of spring. This year it falls on 12 February 2021 and it is the Year of the Ox. There are many traditions held with Chinese New Year and decorating the house is one of them and these Chinese New Year crafts are easy and fun.
Everything is new and coming back to life, making the start of a prosperous beginning. I love heading to our local Chinese supermarket as all their decorations are up and it looks fab!
Parent-approved easy Chinese New Year crafts for kids
Here are a few ideas from some lovely bloggers if you fancy trying your hand at some arts and crafts.
Chinese paper lantern crafts
The Lantern Festival is held on the final day of the Chinese New Year celebrations. The red lanterns symbolise good luck and the letting go of the owner’s past selves.
The crafting blogger and author (and BritMums friend!) Red Ted Art has how-tos and printables for dragon crafts, paper Chinese lantern crafts, Chinese fans and more.

Louise from Little Hearts Big Love also has a simple Chinese paper lantern craft – I used to love making these at school!

Jenny from The Gingerbread House has made beautiful Chinese lantern sun catchers. These look really effective using cellophane squares and contact paper.
Chinese dragon crafts for Chinese New Year
Louise from Messy Little Monster has a fab egg box dragon puppet. It is a really simple craft for kids and always good to do a bit of junk modelling and upcycling.

This Chinese dragon mask by Wendy at Daisies and Pie looks like loads of fun to make. The kids could really go to town on this especially with the tissue paper fire!

Another one also using paper plates is this cool movable Chinese dragon paper plate made by Kate at Crafts on Sea. This does involve a bit of concertina style folding and sticking but the end result looks great.

Make a cute looking Chinese dragon with Maria from Suburban Mum. Maria has used card, glue, googly eyes and lots of sparkle to create her dragon.

Lastly, Angela from The Inspiration Edit has shown us how to make some lovely dragon masks. She has even made some templates to print out — a brilliant Chinese New Year craft for toddlers and pre-schoolers.

Fai Chun craft ideas
The lovely Nita from Mummy Wishes has put together 3 DIY Fai Chun ideas for Chinese New Year. These can be downloaded as printables. Fai Chun’s or Spring Couplets are red pieces of rectangular piece paper with auspicious phrases written on them usually in red or black ink and can range from two to four words. Red has always represented good luck in Chinese culture and according to legend, is suppose to scare away the monster (Nian) who visits on New Years Eve. Therefore, Fai Chun’s are usually stuck on doors and around the house.
Easy craft for Chinese New Year
Ease into the Chinese New Year crafts with this colouring sheet for Year of the Ox printable from Jane at Hodge Podge Days. In her archives you’ll also find this paper plate craft: an easy Chinese drum. Chinese drums are small drums with two pellets or beads on the sides. You twist the long stick and the beads swing forward and back, rhythmically tapping the drum. They’re quite easy to play once you’ve got the hang of it and they’re really run instruments for kids to play too.

Happy crafting!
More Chinese New Year celebration ideas
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15 easy and delicious Chinese New Year recipes you’ll love
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About Sarah Stockley
Sarah is mum to three children and a plethora of animals (mostly cats) and lives in Surrey. You'll often find her family exploring the great outdoors, foraging in the woods, camping and visiting festivals. Sarah also loves to upcycle things and will happily turn an old pallet into a rustic shabby chic sign. She studied Art and Design at college and when she's not blogging at Kippers and Curtains she also likes to make bohemian style dreamcatchers. This mum is also never far from her camera - much to the annoyance of her children.
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