Carousel Horse Crafts

As a class craft, paint a carousel horse on a wall mural

Carousels are fascinating for children and adults alike with the colorful horses, circus music and motion. Carousels are a favorite for horse-lovers and add a sense of nostalgia. Carousel crafts revive the happy memories of riding horses on the carousel, blends them with the color and glitz of the circus and creates interesting, even practical, items for the home.

Paper Crafts

Use your imagination to make paper carousel horse crafts. Draw or download an image of a carousel horse onto cardstock. Use paint or glitter pens to add glitz. Cut a foot-long piece of cardboard that's 1 inch wide. Glue or tape the back of the horse to the middle of the strip. Create a carousel background on construction paper. Cut a slit into the background toward the top and bottom of where a horse should go. Add the horse to the background, tucking the strip into the slits. You can now move the horse up and down against the background.

For another paper carousel horse craft, draw a picture or use a photograph you wish to frame. Glue onto cardstock. Cut 2-inch carousel horse images from different colors of construction paper. Cut enough to fit around the outside edges of the cardstock to create a carousel horse craft frame.

Styrofoam Crafts

Use a Styrofoam wreath ring to make a carousel. Spray paint the ring. Download or draw and decorate six carousel horses, each 4 inches tall. Glue to a cardboard backing with white glue or spray adhesive, then cut out. Glue or tape the horses to thin dowels that 8 inches long. Stick the rods into the Styrofoam around the ring. Use as a centerpiece by adding greenery around the horses and a candle in the center. You can create a mobile by attaching ribbon to the carousel horses and hanging from the Styrofoam ring.

Brick Crafts

Cut carousel horses from cardstock, making a duplicate for each horse. Decorate one side of each horse with miniature colorful beads. Fasten 12-inch dowels to the undecorated side of half the the horses. Add a duplicate horse to each dowel, sandwiching it between the horses.

Make a pair of bookends from two bricks. Spray paint two bricks, one for each bookend. Bricks have two large flat sides, two long narrow sides, and two short narrow sides. Drill a 2-inch hole in the middle of one of the long narrow sides. Add a horse carousel dowel rod to the hole, using glue to secure it. Do the same to the other brick, and place the bricks on either side of a row of books.

To make a brick carousel centerpiece, Stack two bricks on their large flat sides and spray pain them. From the top down, drill two holes, making them 2 inches from each end for two carousel horse rods. Push the rods into the holes. In the center, add a candle and greenery for a centerpiece.

Plastic

Cut carousel horses from plastic lids. Decorate with glitter pens. Use them to add a wall border to a child’s room. Cut a wreath from cardboard. Wrap with bright-colored ribbon. Add the plastic carousel horses around the wreath. Punch a hole in the top of the plastic lid carousel horses and add ribbon ties. Use as ornaments.

References

• Ultimate Horse Fun: Carousel Horse Holder