Today is Day 19 of the Creative Christmas Countdown and we will be sharing with you how we created TWO Snow Villages to play with at our house! We are so excited to be participating in this countdown with 23 other fabulous bloggers!
I have never had a snow village but thought it would be a fun decoration to have at our house, so we decided to create something that looked good and was fun to play with/eat too! 🙂
Here are the two creations we came up with...
1. A Snow Village made out blocks
2. A rice crispy Snow Village
Here's how we created them...
Block Snow Village
Materials Needed: blocks, scissors, white cardstock, pastel and white paint, paint brushes, packing peanuts (or cotton balls or white tissue paper), double-sided tape, markers, and glue
1. We gathered up blocks from our block bucket and traced them onto white paper. We have these Melissa and Doug blocks, but any blocks will work.
2. Mix up some paint and paint your block outlines. I learned that if you cut them out after you paint, the paper doesn't roll up at the edges as much.
3. Cut out some white triangles to use as roofs (or paint some like we did) and grab some packing peanuts (or other white fluffy items).
4. Cut up the packing peanuts
5. Glue them to the roofs.
6. Let everything dry and then cut everything out.
7. Attach the pieces to the blocks using double stick tape.
8. Make some trees using green cardstock half circles and staples. Add some white puffy paint to create snow.
9. Cut out doors and window panes. Draw lines on the windows and then stick them on to the houses.
(We also made a railroad track to go on the top of our tunnel block)
10. Work together to set up your scene and then grab your friends to come play.
Watch out! The Lego men sure know how to throw snowballs!
Thomas and friends didn't want to be left out either!
We had such a fun afternoon playing with our snow village!!
Rice Crispy Snow Village
This village is much simpler and yummy!
Materials Needed: box of rice crispies (any version), wooden spoon, bag of marshmallows, butter (6 tablespoons), candies to decorate with, ice cream cones for trees, sprinkles, frosting (homemade or store bought- we were lazy and just bought some), plastic knife, and a house template (if you want one there are some measurements here from Rice Crispies), and a cookie sheet.
1. To create our rice crispies we followed the directions on the box... they were too gooey, so if I were you I would follow this recipe to make your rice crispy treats so that they are firm and don't collapse.
2. Once the treats were done I flattened them out in a cookie sheet and then cut around my templates to make the house pieces.
3. Next I set them aside and put them in the fridge for about 20 minutes to harden up (while we snacked on the remnants!)
4. Then we added frosting and put the houses together. We made three houses total.
5. Then we started decorating!!
6. To make the snowy tree we just frosted the ice cream cone with white frosting and then dropped lots of green sprinkles on it!
7. We also did a lot of sampling 🙂 Here is my son claiming his territory!
(For one house we mixed some cocoa in the rice crispy treats to change the color of the roof up a bit!)
After about an hour of standing, our gooey houses collapsed (the roofs sunk in), which is why I would recommend using the recipe above (and not using the recipe on the box like I did). 🙂
The goal of this activity was the experience, not the end product though... so my son didn't care AT ALL about the destruction.
He has spent practically every moment since we made these on Saturday trying to sneak more tastes. 🙂 Definitely a successful and fun activity!
I don't know why I never thought to make a rice crispy "gingerbread house" before... It was so delicious!
Wowzers! That was a long and detailed post. I hope you enjoyed these little villages that we created. Thanks for stopping by!
Make sure to check out Day 20 of the Creative Christmas Countdown here tomorrow!
Have you missed any of the other posts? You can head on over to the Creative with Kids Christmas Countdown page to catch up!
Hope you have fun with this activity, too! And be sure to check out the entire Creative Christmas Countdown calendar for more family holiday activities from these fabulous bloggers:
3. Red Ted Art
8. Mama Pea Pod
10. Nurture Store
15. Kitchen Counter Chronicles
16. Living at the Whitehead’s Zoo
19. Toddler Approved
22. Science Sparks
Help! I want to do this so badly but your link to the recipe doesn't link to a recipe, rather a page with no recipe. Would you kindly email me or comment how to make the treats that don't droop? Thank you
It is the holiday candy house recipe here ricekrispies.com/en_US/recipes/holiday-candy-cottage.html#/en_US/recipes/holiday-candy-cottage Enjoy!
Both of the villages are adorable!
WOW, that is such a great idea! I especially love the Rice Krispie one!
Wow I absolutely love your snow village. It is hot here but I am going to make a snow village anyway. Thanks.
I love the Rice Krispie village. If we don't have time before Christmas, I figure it's still appropriate after Christmas because it's still winter which means snow!
Chrissy- you need to do it. They were SO MUCH easier than gingerbread houses. I think I am a complete convert to these now. Post if you make them!
I love your houses! So cute 🙂 We didn't even do gingerbread houses this year – the Rice Krispies houses might be easier and we still have time!
Thanks friends! We had a lot of fun and I ate way too many rice crispies!
Jill- I am a marshmallow hoarder. Today I bought 3 more bags… just in case we want to do this again 🙂
Laura- I cannot believe they don't get out till Thursday! Bummer. Hope they get some extra time after Christmas so you can do loads of fun things.
Anastasia- That is so fun that you made one before!! It is going to be a new tradition at our house!
AWWWWW, I almost cried! I did this as a little kid and completely forgot, until i saw your pictures! What a wonderful craft.
I love it! I shared it on my blog.
I am loving these, what great ideas! We are going to have some fun over winter break doing these!
WONDERFUL!!!! The rice krispy snow village sounds like a perfect Christmas activity. (Lucky we still have a few more days… but what if I don't want to share my marshmallows?) 😉
so very cute! I love the rice crispy idea a lot and think my kids would love to do that this week. Can you believe they don't get out of school until Thursday? I am bummed about that. I love your cute pastel colored village too. What great ideas.
Love this.."can we make the block one" the words of my 5 year old daughter! Thanks for sharing!