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Nature Craft: making leaf prints

September 18, 2018 by Catherine 15 Comments

Isn’t autumn just wonderful for crafting inspiration?  We’ve done so many lovely craft activities already this season, and these simple leaf prints are perfect for combining nature play with an art activity to create a homemade masterpiece.

This is just one of the fun nature projects in my book, ‘A Year of Nature Craft and Play’ (co-authored with Becky Goddard-Hill).  There’s an activity for every week of the year and it includes fun crafts, gardening, nature games, art and science experiments – perfect for inspiring kids to get creative with nature.

With so many fabulous leaves lying around, we thought we’d get the paints out and put them to good use.  First job was to head out for a nature walk in the park to find some leaves in varying shapes and sizes.

woodland leaf hunt

After a good debate about which leaves were our favourites, and which ones might make good prints, the kids chose this selection.

autumn leaves

We used white A3 paper to make our leaf prints, simply because that’s what we had in the craft box.  It worked well with strongly coloured paints, although I do love the idea of using black paper with some super-bright neon paints too.

nature craft leaf prints

We painted one side of each leaf, then pressed it carefully onto the paper.

nature craft leaf prints

You do need to be a little bit careful when you press the leaves down, to avoid making them slide around too much.  We found that peeling them off slowly left a better imprint from the leaf too.

nature craft leaf prints

Here are our finished leaf prints – what do you think?

nature craft leaf prints

This was a super-simple craft which needed hardly any preparation, I love how the kids could just let their imaginations loose with colour mixing, patterns and thickness of paint.  We talked about how we might do it differently next time, and the kids want to try cutting out the leaves when they’re dry to make them into a mobile – sounds good doesn’t it!

If you’ve got an impressive leaf collection, you might also like to have a go at my mason jar lanterns or my pumpkin fairy house.  I’ve also got a lovely roundup of 15 autumn nature crafts to keep you busy!

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How to make simple leaf prints painting using natural materials - a fun nature craft that's perfect for autumn!

This post has been included in Twinkl’s End of Terms Activities blog

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Filed Under: Craft, Kids Craft, Nature Craft Tagged With: Activity, Autumn, Children, craft, Leaves, naturally crafty, Nature, Outdoors

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Comments

  1. Linda aka Crafty Gardener says

    November 4, 2016 at 10:28 pm

    Such a fun Fall activity.

    Reply
    • Catherine says

      November 6, 2016 at 7:57 pm

      It’s been one of our favourites this season, I think the fact that it’s a bit messy just adds to the fun!

      Reply
  2. Tara says

    November 7, 2016 at 2:43 pm

    This looks like fabulous fun. I love the colours in your photos, they definitely show-off the season in all its glory. #chasingnature

    Reply
  3. Catherine says

    November 7, 2016 at 5:29 pm

    Thanks Tara – nature just knows how to do colour doesn’t it?!

    Reply
  4. Kelly Robinson says

    November 12, 2016 at 8:01 pm

    What a wonderful selection of leaves and the prints came out so amazingly well. Love the idea of using neon paint on black paper. I can imagine the results being quite impressive! Thank you for adding another wonderful post to #ChasingNature

    Reply
    • Catherine says

      November 13, 2016 at 8:06 am

      I was quite surprised at just how much detail we got on the prints, even with tonnes of paint and little hands! We learnt that you can print the same leaf a few times before putting paint on it again too.

      Reply
  5. Tamsin Mathias says

    November 12, 2016 at 11:10 pm

    This looks like so much fun! I must have done something like this in school at some point, but I really can’t remember! I’ll have to try it with Esme when she’s a little bit older. She wouldn’t be all that bothered given her current age, and I’d look a little silly doing it by myself! Haha!

    #ChasingNature

    Reply
    • Catherine says

      November 13, 2016 at 1:34 pm

      Ah it’ll be a fab one to do when she’s a little bit older – I can’t remember doing it at school either, we did lots of potato printing though!

      Reply
  6. Jennifer says

    November 21, 2016 at 9:52 am

    That looks so much fun, and what a lovely piece of art when it’s finished! Thank you for linking up to #CraftingismyTherapy 🙂

    Reply
  7. Me, You and Magoo says

    November 23, 2016 at 10:00 pm

    Such a fun craft, we collected loads of leaves this year. I like the idea of a mobile…maybe a garland to hang on fireplace might be nice too. Thank you for linking up #craftingismytherapy

    Reply
    • Catherine says

      November 24, 2016 at 9:26 am

      Ooh yes a garland would be brilliant!

      Reply
  8. Ollie Oakley says

    September 20, 2018 at 12:22 am

    I remember doing this as well when I was a kid. This is actually one of the reasons why fall was a much-awaited time for my little self back then. 🙂

    Thanks for sharing!

    Reply

Trackbacks

  1. #ChasingNature Week 6 Round Up | says:
    November 12, 2016 at 11:47 pm

    […] favourite blog post this week was by Catherine from Growing Family. Catherine wrote about Nature Craft, and how you can make wonderful prints with autumn leaves. I absolutely loved the idea, and the […]

    Reply
  2. Welcome to Autumn: ideas for fun (that won’t break the bank). – Mummy Est.2014 says:
    September 1, 2017 at 8:33 am

    […] Click Here for some great leaf printing ideas from ‘Growing Family’ who is also a fan of leafy Autumn days out. […]

    Reply
  3. 17 Autumn activities to share with your family - Exeter Baby Activities says:
    October 9, 2017 at 8:43 am

    […] Wet days always seem to turn into painting days for us, so we are going to try Catherine’s leaf print ideas very […]

    Reply

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Hi, I’m Catherine. Welcome to Growing Family, a top UK home & garden blog sharing ideas, inspiration and tips for making the most of busy family life, indoors and out.
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