Topic: Happy Hooligans is dedicated to easy and affordable arts & crafts, and playtime!

[Software Santa]

Happy Hooligans is dedicated to easy and affordable arts & crafts and good, old-fashioned play!

  A Software Santa Pick!  

Kid's Activities - Play Ideas for Toddlers and Preschoolers

On these pages, you'll find dozens of inexpensive, fun, and educational activities for toddlers, preschoolers and elementary kids too.
Scroll through the pages in this category to see loads of simple science experiments, summer activities, winter activities, and terrific ways to create a magical outdoor play space on a shoestring budget.

You'll find water activities, sensory bins, activities to help develop fine motor skills, cutting skills, and balance and co-ordination.
There are tons of ideas for pretend play and messy and muddy play, and good, old-fashioned play ideas that will help to create childhood memories that will last a lifetime.
Easy Crafts For Kids

We do a lot of crafting here in my daycare, so you'll find hundreds of crafts for kids of all ages in this category. There are loads of toddler crafts, preschool crafts, kindergarten crafts, and crafts for  elementary kids and tweens as well.

If you're looking for seasonal and holiday crafts, we have tons. You'll also find handprint crafts, nature crafts,  wind chimes, bird feeders and everything in between. We have loads of kid-made gift ideas too.

Almost all of our crafts are made from common materials like paper plates, toilet rolls, tissue paper and other common supplies and materials that you have around your house. And of course, our projects are creative, inexpensive, and always fun and easy for to kids to make.

Art Activities for Kids

Kids love art. Whether it's drawing, painting or experimenting with fun, new creative processes, kids of all ages love expressing themselves through art.

On the following pages, you'll find easy art projects and art activities for toddlers, preschoolers, kindergarten and elementary students, and tweens.

All of our art projects are fun and easy, and can be done with supplies that you have around the house. From "scrape painting" with credit cards and "drip painting" with liquid watercolours to more traditional art projects like "crayon resist" art, you'll find tons of simple art ideas for kids to do alone or to do in a group setting at daycare or in the classroom.

Scroll through the pages to below to see loads of ideas for:

• open-ended art
• paint recipes
• easy painting techniques
• nature art
• outdoor art
• messy art
• sensory art ideas.

About Me

Welcome!

I’m Jackie Currie, the creative spirit behind Happy Hooligans.  I’m a mom, a wife, a daycare provider, and a self-proclaimed glitterphobe. I’m working on that last bit and making progress.

My blog, Happy Hooligans, centres around the daily activities of my home daycare, and is dedicated to easy and affordable arts & crafts and good, old-fashioned play.

My own boys are teenagers now, but happily, I still have plenty of little ones in my life.
For this, I am grateful because toddlers and preschoolers are my passion.
These are the little people that I lovingly refer to as “The Hooligans”.
They’re the children in my home daycare, and the reason that my blog exists!

Once upon a time, I had a career in banking. I started out as a bank teller and worked my way up into management. Along the way, I met the great guy who would one day become my husband when we worked together for a few years at the same branch. I enjoyed my career, but my dream was to one day have a family and to be at home with my babies.

In 1997, the first part of my dream came true when my husband and I welcomed our first son into the world.
Now to make the second part happen …

Because of my life-long love for children, I was certain that a home daycare would be right up my alley and an enriching and wonderful way to subsidize our family’s income while being a stay-at-home-mom.
I opened the doors to my daycare in 1998 when our son was 11 months old, and never looked back.
2 years later, we welcomed our second son into the world, and my dream was complete.  I was at home, raising my family and beginning the most rewarding career of my life.

I can say without a doubt that my daycare has filled me with more joy, passion and satisfaction than my career in the corporate world ever could have.
I often say I have one of the best jobs on the planet.
My home daycare allowed me to be at home with my boys during their formative years and to give them my full attention, while making their days fun, adventurous and educational.

As well as having their mom at home with them, my sons had the added bonus of growing up surrounded by the other children (the hooligans) in our daycare.
My boys have long since graduated from my daycare thankfully, I’m still surrounded by little ones. The hooligans and I spend our days crafting, baking, creating, learning, exploring, discovering and adventuring.
We’re all about old-fashioned fun here in my daycare: getting messy, imaginative play, outdoor adventure, and free, unstructured play.

I hope, as you browse through the crafts and activities on my blog, you’ll be inspired to do some of the same with your own children.
Whether you’re visiting for the first time, or you’ve been following us for years, thank you for stopping in.
I am honoured to share our experiences and ideas with you and thankful to have you here.

I am grateful too, for the many talented early-years bloggers who inspire me to be the best I can be, and to make the hooligans’ world more exciting, engaging and adventurous. Those bloggers have helped me to take my own creativity to a new level. To them, I say Thank You!
It is my hope that we hooligans might inspire others in the same way.

Yours in Play,

Jackie & The Hooligans

Every month, more than 2 million parents, teachers and caregivers turn to Happy Hooligans for creative inspiration, and 1.5 million fans follow the hooligans on Facebook.

In addition to writing for her own blog, Jackie is a Senior Writer for CBC Parents, has written numerous articles for Treehouse Parents, has appeared on CTV’s Canada AM, and has been featured in Good Housekeeping Magazine, Woman’s Day, Woman’s World, Today’s Parent, Parents Magazine.

https://happyhooligans.ca/