Chinese New Year crafts for kids with Lunar New Year book

We have a fabulous book, and a BUMPER set of ideas for Chinese New Year crafts for kids for you in this article. Ideas that will be perfect to bring in the Lunar New Year, and a wonderful free eBook if you are part of the Shelf Care club, to help you understand just what Chinese New Year is all about.

Our book is filled with creative and fun craft ideas that are perfect for children. From making dumplings to creating red envelope decorations, there is something for every age group and skill level. These crafts not only provide entertainment, but they also give children a hands-on learning experience about Chinese culture. There are so many amazing traditional around Chinese New Year, from chinese lanterns, to paper fortune cookies. But where do these ideas come from?

Check out our book club, or the book, and you’ll find out. Scroll down, and you can even join in with some of these fun Chinese New Year craft ideas, as we are sharing the following with you too in printable format:

• Cook your own dumplings,
• Make your own lucky red envelopes,
• Make your own paper lanterns, 
• Create a dragon puppet, and
• Other amazing activity ideas from the book Lunar New Year from Quarto Kids.

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We think that this is an amazing idea, good luck with all the activities too – we hope you have loads of fun. These crafts are a great way to keep little hands busy, and a fun way to celebrate the New Year. If you read the book alongside the crafts, you can see the ways Asian countries celebrate the Chinese calendar.

So what’s the book all about then?

The book takes you on a 15-day journey, sharing the excitement, preparations, and symbolic traditions that mark the Lunar New Year. Join Ling, her sister Mei, and their grandmother Po Po as they embark on festive activities like cleaning their home thoroughly, gathering fresh flowers, visiting loved ones, and parading with radiant red lanterns in their community. The reader gets an authentic glimpse into Ling’s family life and the intimate details of their Lunar New Year celebrations.

A 16-page ‘factivity’ section follows the narrative, offering a deeper understanding of the festival’s significance in China and other parts of the world. It also features enriching activities such as solving riddles, creating your own red envelope, and even a recipe to make mouth-watering Lunar New Year ‘pot sticker’ dumplings.

Focus on Lunar New Year fun

The book uncovers the magic of Lunar New Year by taking you through:

• The meticulous preparations leading up to the spring festival
• The family reunion dinner on New Year’s Eve as part of the festival celebrations,
• The spectacular New Year’s Day fireworks
• The thrilling dragon dances, Chinese drum, and the New Year Monster
• The radiant lantern festival with the colorful Chinese paper lanterns… and so much more, including all the Chinese New Years crafts we promised!

As part of the Celebrations & Festivals series, this book welcomes you into the heart of a family’s festivities, offering a delightful exploration of various religious and cultural celebrations worldwide. The heartening story is complemented by a fun ‘factivity’ section that provides more details about the festival along with exciting activities, recipes, and craft projects for you to indulge in.

We are sharing with you to help kids of all ages appreciate the joy of the Dragon dance, and all the different animals involved within the Chinese zodiac. Why not check out the book and find out if you were born in the year of the Tiger, or the Year of the Rabbit. 2024 is the Year of the Dragon, one of our personal favourites. We do have a fabulous paper plate dragon craft that you can check out too. Below is the chance to make your own Chinese dragon with a Chinese New Year dragon puppet – perfect for this year’s (and other years too) Chinese New Year celebration.

What does the activity pack look like?

As always, alongside the amazing book we are covering for you today, we have an activity pack. This time this includes some stand alone printable template ideas for you with easy craft options for fun activities to do with the kids as part of the celebrations. The simple crafts included within the pack are a lot of fun for the kids, and don’t take much preparation either. As always, we are sharing with you the sheets that come with our 13-page activity set of easy Chinese New Year crafts. We really hope you like them:

Cover and coloring page

Our first two pages are the cover of the book, with its colorful designs, Chinese zodiac animals, and Ling’s family members illustrated, having lots of fun with their Cinese New Year activities – fireworks, their very own huge Chinese dragon puppet, and lots of jumping around and joy. The second page is a coloring image from the book – you can either color in the Chinese characters and dragon, or pick out the suggestions to color. The choice is yours.

Now we are going to share with you some of the amazing crafts and templates we have in the activity pack.

Chinese New Year Trivia, and draw your own dragon

For our next two ideas, we are moving on from our Chinese Near Year crafts ideas for kids, and we are sharing with you some trivia questions around the Chinese New Year from the New Lunar Year book – if you want the answers, you can get the book as they are all in there! Our second idea gives your kids a chance to get a little creative. Draw your own dragon for the Chinese New Year!

Color a kite and honour your ancestors

For our next activities for Chinese New Year, we have another coloring activity. For this one, you can design and color a kite that you might like to fly with Ling after the celebrations. Consequently, we would love if you can remember someone within your family that you have lost. As they do within the book, and as part of the New Year celebrations in Asia. Honour one of your ancestors too, perhaps a grandparent, parent, auntie, or uncle that has died.

What about discussing them with your family too, so you can remember them together?

What is compromise activity

For our final activity within the set of 13 pages, we have a couple of thoughts and ideas for slightly older children, introducing the idea of the importance of compromising to children. Arguments are bound to happen in our lives, and it is about learning to compromise with those around us to show respect for others, and kindness.

Why not work through these with your children to help them to cope with arguments? It will help to improve their empathy for others too.

We really do hope you like this. Don’t forget to sign up for the FREE book club for kids to get a free eBook every single month. As we have already said, you can also win the hard copy of the book if you are UK based too.

First Name:

Last Name:

Address:

Phone Number:

Website:

Birth years of all your children:

Are you a blogger or influencer? (Yes/No):

Email:

I agree to receive email updates and promotions.

Join the Shelf Care Children’s Book Club now

To download the activity pack – just click on the button or the image below:

We really hope you like this activity. Do check out some of the other ideas for have for Chinese New year here too:

We love a dragon on KiddyCharts. These ideas work for 2024. Additionally, you can also search on other animals on the site too. There are loads of fabulous ideas across the board here:

Here are some more ideas for Chinese New Year crafts for kids off site:

We think there are LOADS of things for you to do with the kids for Chinese New Year. Have loads of fun.

Take care,

Helen

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