This little jumping jack St. Patrick’s Day craft for kids is a real crowd pleaser! Not only is it simple and easy to make, it’s lots of fun to play with when it is finished. Best of all, it only needs a few inexpensive materials that you probably already have at home! Kids of all ages will enjoy this craft, from toddlers (with a little help of course!) to preschoolers and big kids too! I did this with my three year-old and he loved it. He did need a lot of help, but he was able to glue the pieces together on his own, and he was delighted with the final product! My eight year-old and twelve year-old also enjoyed making this fun St. Patrick’s Day craft for kids, and they were able to complete it independently. It’s was a fun way to spend some time together and a great way to get festive for St. Patrick’s Day! Read on for the free pattern and tutorial for this cute St. Patrick’s Day craft for kids!
Materials for Leprechaun Jumping Jack St. Patrick’s Day Craft for Kids
You only need a few simple materials to make your leprechaun jumping jack!
- Card stock – you will need a variety of colors. I used green (for the leprechaun’s body, hat, arms, and legs), black (for the belt and hat band), cream (for the face and hands), yellow (for the buckles), and orange (for the beard).
- Scissors
- Brads – you will need four brads for each leprechaun.
- Glue – you can use white glue or a glue stick, either will work fine. Alternatively, you can use double sided tape or glue dots.
- String – it needs to be pretty thin. Yarn or twine is too thick.
- Leprechaun Jumping Jack printables – you can print the free PDF below.
Instructions for the Leprechaun Jumping Jack
- Print the Leprechaun Jumping Jack pattern. You can print the pattern directly onto card stock if you want, or print it out on a piece of printer paper and use that as a pattern. I printed the page with the body, arms, legs, and hat onto a piece of green card stock and made a pattern for the rest of the pieces and just traced them onto the different colors.
- Cut out the pieces of the leprechaun.
- Punch the holes in the arms, legs, and body. I used a tiny hole punch for this. You could also use a sewing needle, a skewer, or an Exacto knife to poke the holes.
- Now it’s time to start assembling your leprechaun jumping jack.
- Glue the face to the head of the body.
- Glue the beard to the face.
- Glue the hat band to the hat and the buckle over the hat band.
- Glue the belt to the leprechaun’s belly and the buckle onto the belt.
- Glue the Leprechaun’s hat to his head.
The leprechaun is coming along!
- Now glue the hands to the arms, letting the arms pieces overlap the wrist portion of the hands.
- Glue the boots to the bottom of the legs.
- Now it’s time to put the arms and legs onto the body! To do this, first widen the bottom holes in the arms and legs and the holes in the body so that the limbs can attach loosely to the body and allow movement when your jumping jack is assembled. You can stick a pencil through the hole and twist it to make the hole a bit bigger.
- Now you can attach the arms and legs to the leprechaun’s body. Put a brad into each of the holes of the body. Put the arms and legs onto the brads in the proper places on the back of the body.
- Open the brads over a pair of scissors to keep them nice and loose.
- Check that the arms and legs swing freely. This is important so that the leprechaun’s arms will move up and down easily when the string is attached.
- Now it’s time to attach the string! Cut a piece of string about a foot in length.
- Hold the leprechaun’s arms down, close to his body. With the arms down, thread the string through the top hole of each arm, making a loop. Make sure the loop is fairly taught between the arms, then tie a knot. Tie another knot in the tail of the string.
- Repeat this process for the leprechaun’s legs.
- Test out the string by giving it a gentle pull. You should be able to move the leprechaun’s arms and legs up and down by pulling on the string, then letting go.
- It’s time for the final touch! Draw a face on your leprechaun with a marker or colored pencils to finish him off.
Your leprechaun jumping jack St. Patrick’s Day craft for kids is all finished! Look at those cute little guys!
Leprechaun Jumping Jack St. Patrick’s Day Craft for Kids Pattern
Here is the leprechaun jumping jack pattern. Please remember that this pattern is for personal use only, it is not to be reproduced, altered, or used for commercial purposes in any way. Classroom use is fine. By printing and using this pattern, you agree to these terms. Thank you!
Thank you for visiting! I hope you enjoyed this fun St. Patrick’s Day craft for kids! Here are some more crafts that you might enjoy:
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