Need a simple Halloween craft that you can make with your kids? Try this pom-pom spider craft today!
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If you do crafts with your little ones, chances are you have these three things in a drawer somewhere: pipe cleaners, pom poms, and googly eyes. Your children probably have taken them out several times, thrown them all over the floor, and left the mess for you to clean up.
Did the thought of throwing out perfectly good craft materials run through your mind every time this happens?
Here is your chance to use up all these extra craft materials you have laying around. These pom-pom spiders are not only cute, but they are super easy and quick to make. Therefore, they make the perfect Halloween decoration for your house!
How to Make Pom-Pom Spiders
Materials:
Directions:
- Cut the pipe cleaners a half, making four shorter pipe cleaners.
- Bend the four pipe cleaners a half. Hook the bent pipe cleaners together. There is no “right” way to do this. If you can’t get the pipe cleaners to stay together, you can twist one of the pipe cleaners around the others. However, you need to make sure that the legs all align, so the spider doesn’t have two short legs.
- Place cricks in each leg. I made one crick for the patella (the “kneecap”) and one for the tarsus (kind of the ankle part of the leg). I did a lot of analyzing blown up pictures of real spiders to find these spider anatomy vocabularies, and I don’t think I can sleep tonight.
- Use the hot glue gun and glue the googly eyes on the pom-pom.
- Glue the pom-pom onto the legs.
I decided to use the hot glue gun instead of Elmer’s glue because, in my experience with pom-poms, Elmer’s glue doesn’t work. It takes forever to dry, and even after it dries the materials still don’t stick to each other.
Play “Itsy Bitsy” spider in the background while you make the pom-pom spiders with your children! They will love singing along to one of the favorite toddler songs of all time while making this fun Halloween craft!
More Halloween Crafts: Easy Paper Plate Pumpkin Craft
Fun Spider Facts for Kids
We have had so many spiders around the house this summer, so the kids are very interested in the 8-legged creature. Here are some interesting facts that you can teach your kids about spiders (source):
- Spiders are not insects. They have eight legs, not six!
- There are two ways spiders digest their food: a) They pump digestive enzymes into the prey that liquefy the inside of the victim. Then the spider sucks out the liquefied tissues, leaving the empty husk of the prey (shivers). b) The spider uses its serrated mouth to shred the prey while injecting the venom to liquefy the tissues.
- There are two types of spiders: a) wandering spiders, which actively search and hunt for their prey, and b) web-building spiders, which wait for the victim to fly or walk into their webs.
- While the web-building spiders spin silk to catch their prey in webs, the wandering spiders use the silk as bungee cords or ways to get around.
Spiders don’t usually bite humans, but they will bite if they feel like they need to defend themselves. While the venom is poisonous and will cause you some discomfort, most spider bites should be equivalent to getting bitten by a mosquito or stung by a bee.
However, a bite from black widow spiders can be fatal. Its venom is 15 times stronger than that of a rattlesnake (source). These spiders are named black widows because they are known to kill and eat their counterparts after the mating ritual. Ouch.
Unfortunately for us living in SoCal, we do have black widows around. I have seen them outside the house (thank goodness not inside) and remove them from the premises immediately. Can’t risk having my pets and children encountering one!
Have a Creepy Crawly Halloween!
I need a bath after reading about spiders and looking at way too many pictures of different spiders. But they are fascinating creatures! Use this pom-pom spider craft as an opportunity to teach your children about them.
Want more “creepy” creatures craft for this Halloween? Check out this Flying Paper Tube Bat that your kids will love!
