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Twas the Night Before Christmas Shoe Box Puppet Theatre

It’s not long until Christmas now and one of my favourite Christmas traditions is to read the story ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas’ to my boys on Christmas Eve, before the kids head up to bed.

Simple Christmas Craft and Play activity for Kids. DIY puppet theatre based on the story Twas the Night Before Christmas ideal for Kids to Make.

Instead of just reading the story this year, why don’t you try creating a special craft from the story?  I have come up with this easy puppet theatre craft made from an old shoe box and items you’ll have around the house.

The great thing about it is that you can make it as easy or complicated as you want, with a huge amount of variations depending on what you are looking to do with it.

Materials Needed to Create your own Christmas Shoe Box Puppet Theatre

Simple Christmas Craft and Play activity for Kids. DIY puppet theatre based on the story Twas the Night Before Christmas ideal for Kids to Make.

Shoe box

Scissors

Several sheets of thin card

Pens/pencils/crayons

Lollipop sticks

Glue

Wrapping paper (optional)

Sellotape (optional)

Blue tak

How to Create your Christmas Show Box Theatre

  1. Cut a rectangle with a 2cm border out of the bottom of the box (see photo), this will be the window to see the puppet show.Simple Christmas Craft and Play activity for Kids. DIY puppet theatre based on the story Twas the Night Before Christmas ideal for Kids to Make.
  2. Cut one long side off the lid of the box.
  3. Draw a background onto a sheet of card and glue onto the inside of the lid. I chose to draw a living area of a house complete with Christmas tree and fireplace, but you could also draw the outside of a house covered in snow.  Or even two backgrounds, with one glued to the lid and the other held in place  above the main image with a couple of paperclips, when needed.Simple Christmas Craft and Play activity for Kids. DIY puppet theatre based on the story Twas the Night Before Christmas ideal for Kids to Make.
  4. Next you need to cut 2 slits into the top of the bottom of the box, this is where the puppets will be inserted through. Ours were approximately a 2cm gap between the two slits and the slits themselves were approximately 3mm wide.Simple Christmas Craft and Play activity for Kids. DIY puppet theatre based on the story Twas the Night Before Christmas ideal for Kids to Make.
  5. On another piece of card draw characters from the story. We chose to have a tiny St Nick and reindeer flying through the sky, a jolly old St Nick for in the house and a child asleep in bed.  You could also have the mother and father, reindeer in the snow (prancing and pawing of each little hoof) or whatever else you would like from the story.Simple Christmas Craft and Play activity for Kids. DIY puppet theatre based on the story Twas the Night Before Christmas ideal for Kids to Make.
  6. Cut around each picture and attach to a lollipop stick using either glue or sellotape. Our box was quite wide so for the Santa and bed we taped two lollipop sticks together lengthwise to make the pictures reach the base of the theatre.Simple Christmas Craft and Play activity for Kids. DIY puppet theatre based on the story Twas the Night Before Christmas ideal for Kids to Make.
  7. Enjoy playing and reciting words from the story with your children!Simple Christmas Craft and Play activity for Kids. DIY puppet theatre based on the story Twas the Night Before Christmas ideal for Kids to Make.

To embellish your box further you can wrap the box in wrapping paper to look a bit more finished, use glitter for parts of the background and puppets and slot in a second background when needed.

Out Now! – Countdown to Christmas Ebook

When life gets hectic in the lead up to Christmas wouldn’t it be great to be able to spend a little time with the family creating gifts for others, food to enjoy together and traditions that make magical Christmas Memories?

But what actually happens is you spend hours searching through Pinterest looking for ideas and realise halfway through saying you are going to start that you have only 1 thing on the materials list!

I’ve been there!

So that is why we’ve put together our 24 favourite Christmas Activities, Crafts and Recipes with full materials lists and step-by-step instructions so that you have everything at your fingertips.

Produced as a PDF you can download, print and use these ideas throughout the festive season with your children and families.

Find out more as we share with your our Favourite Ways to Countdown to Christmas.


Jenny blogs over at Monkey and Mouse and is a mum to two delightfully energetic little boys who love to craft, explore the outdoors and cause chaos!

You can find her on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest.

 

 


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Simple Christmas Craft and Play activity for Kids. DIY puppet theatre based on the story Twas the Night Before Christmas ideal for Kids to Make.

Author
Cerys Parker

Cerys is a marine biologist, environmental educator, teacher, mum, and home educator from the UK. She loves getting creative, whether it is with simple and easy crafts and ideas, activities to make learning fun, or delicious recipes that you and your kids can cook together you'll find them all shared here on Rainy Day Mum.

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