Carrots are great for snacking and crafting.
Carrots are a simple, easy and healthy snack that many kids enjoy. Parents and children together can make eating this economical snack even more fun by making snack time play time. From monarch sandwiches to carrot masterpieces of art, these simple crafts bring a whole new meaning to the phrase playing with your food.
Finger Halloween Snacks Craft
Cut the top and bottoms off one medium-sized carrot for a thumb, and four larger carrots for fingers. Soak the carrots in water to clean them. While the carrots are soaking, put your favorite dip into a serving bowl (hummus, ranch or vegetable dip). Peel the carrots. Using a paring knife, cut notches at the tip of each finger and the thumb. The notches should be narrow and flat. Using cream cheese or dip, place a slivered almond on top of each notch for the fingernails. Serve your fingers by placing them sticking fingernail side up in the bowl of dip.
Carrot Painting Two Ways
Save the tops of two to three carrots (about 4 in. plus greens). Clean and allow them to air dry. Once dry, use the leafy stems at the top as paint brushes to create a masterpiece. Enjoy the bottoms of the carrots as a snack while you paint.
Another way to use carrots to paint is to save the top 2 in. of a carrot and discard the leafy greens attached. The wider the carrot the better for this craft, as you will carve the tops into different shapes to create stamps. Grab paints or stamp pads, and use your carrot stamps to design some original artwork. Enjoy the discarded bottom halves of the carrots for a snack.
Carrot Salad Man
Open a small can of crushed pineapple and drain it. Place it in a bowl with half a cup of cottage cheese or plain/honey/vanilla yogurt. Cut the tops and bottoms off two carrots. Wash the carrots. Peel the carrots, saving some of the longer shavings for later. Grate the carrots, and mix them into the bowl. Put the salad onto a plate. Create a face on your salad with raisins. Take the longer carrot shavings and make hair on the salad man.
Monarch Sandwiches
Cut a slice of bread into two triangles. Place the triangles onto a plate to resemble monarch wings. Wash and peel a carrot. Save two longer shavings. Cut the stick so it is approximately three inches in length. Put the carrot stick on the plate between the two bread wings to resemble a monarch's body. You can add cream cheese, peanut butter or another spread on the wings, and decorate them with raisins or other snacks. Take the longer carrot shavings and place them above the wings to resemble antennae.
Tags: bottoms carrots, carrot shavings, carrots snack, cream cheese, longer carrot, longer carrot shavings, longer shavings