Here is a fun craft that some of the older children might enjoy doing. It’s called a God’s eye and it simply uses sticks and colourful yarn. Learning how to make a god’s eye is easy and you’ll soon find yourself making more than one as you can be as creative as you like with the style and colours.
Do you remember making these as a child? I certainly do. I’m sure I didn’t know what they were called at the time, but regardless, they were fun to make with family and friends when they’d come over to stay. I think I might have even done them on a school camp or two.
Recommended age: 7 years +
God’s eyes are traditionally considered as spiritual object where yarn is woven around sticks. Of course for many others, it’s just a fun craft you can do using very few materials. For older children, they really are quite easy to make and get creative with. All you need is –
- Colourful yarn (I purchased adorable colourful balls of yarn from Spotlight)
- Sticks
- Pipe cleaner
Begin by securing two sticks together and have them cross in the middle. Some children might prefer to use a pipe cleaner to hold it in place.
Tie one end of your yarn to the middle of the cross before you start weaving your God’s eye. Of course there are many different ways to make these, but the most common can be seen in this video demonstration. You are essentially winding the yarn around each of the sticks but in the one direction.
When you are ready to change colours, simply tie your current piece of yarn around one of the sticks before tying on the end of your new colour. Soon enough you’ll have formed some beautiful God’s eyes, which you can hang up or give as gifts.
Of course God’s eyes can be made all sorts of sizes and shapes. This is a little one! Cute, right?
You really are only limited by your imagination when it comes to these. Whist this activity was a little too tricky for Possum (3 years old) I had lots of fun experimenting with different colours, how I weaved the yarn around the sticks and the type of tension I held it.
This is such a lovely activity to do with children. There is something very special and lovely about the feeling of yarn between your fingers and the variety of colours and types available at places like Spotlight is just amazing. I highly recommend checking out small balls of colourful yarn I purchased from Spotlight. Check out the Spotlight website for more details.
Cool. How easy is it? “God’s eye.”
About how much yarn would be required for each one? We are using standard popsicle sticks.
Great question Diane. It really would only take you about 1/4 of a standard ball of wool to make this, less if you are mixing up the colours and changing the balls of wool. Hope that’s helpful to you Diane.