17 Tantalising Octopus Crafts
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Octopuses are strange and wonderful creatures and there are lots of cute octopus crafts you can make with your kids.
If you love octopuses, then you'll absolutely love these easy and fun octopus crafts for kids. We've included fun octopus craft activities for a range of different ages.
Octopus crafts for kids are great fun and they are an easy way to build your kids' fine motor skills. These fun octopus crafts for kids are perfect for anyone who loves the ocean.
These crafty activities will give you and your kids hours of fun and quality time together. You can use your amazing octopus crafts as fun decorations around the house or your kids' bedrooms.
Or you could hold an ocean animal-themed day, dedicated to the ocean. No matter what you use your completed crafts for, you will love these activities and the end results!
Crafty Handprint Octopus
Your kids will love these crafty fun octopus activities. Get your hands messy and create some fun octopus handprints!
What You Will Need:
Child-friendly, easy washable paint
Googly eyes
Cardboard
Guide:
Get your hands all messy with paint!
Using both your hands, with your thumbs together, press down on the piece of cardboard. Your 8 fingers will be the legs and the palms and thumbs will be the body.
Once the paint is dried, you can stick some googly eyes to the body to really bring your octopuses alive!
Easy Paper Plate Octopus
Make a fantastic paper plate octopus with the easy step by step guide below. Your kids will love this craft!
What You Will Need:
One paper plate
Colourful tissue
Colourful pens and paints
Glue
Guide:
Paint, draw or colour your plates to your desire.
Draw on two octopus eyes onto the plate.
Add 8 strips of the colourful tissue to the plate. These will be nice flowing octopus legs.
Fun Play-Doh Octopus
Play-Doh activities are great as they strengthen your kids fine motor skills. You can create some fun octopus crafts out of Play-Doh using the guide below!
What You Will Need:
Play-Doh!
Googly eye crafts
Guide:
Roll the Play-Doh into a ball.
For each ball, roll eight little legs and attach them to the body.
Add some googly eye crafts to your new fun octopus.
Paper Cup Octopuses
This cute craft is similar to the plate one, but the cup gives the octopus a 3D effect.
What You Will Need:
A cardboard cup
Colourful tissue
Colourful pens and paints
Glue
Guide:
Paint, draw or colour your cups to your desire.
Glue on the googly eye crafts.
Add 8 strips of the colourful tissue to the bottom of the cup.
Balloon Octopus
One of our favourite octopus activities, your kids will love this easy craft. Balloons make fantastic fun octopus bodies so they are great for octopus crafts!
What You Will Need:
One balloon
Eight strips of fun and colourful tissue ribbon
Permanent marker - safe for kids
Guide:
Blow up the balloon. To make it easy, fill the balloon to about half capacity.
Glue or tie the eight strips of ribbon to the bottom of the balloon for legs.
Gently draw on some fun eyes onto the balloon.
Cardboard Octopus
This easy craft is one of the easier activities but equally as fun and you'll still love the end crafts.
What You Will Need:
Cardboard
Colourful pens and paints
Any other fun crafts
Guide:
Cut octopus shapes out of cardboard
Paint, draw, colour and stick lots of crafts to your octopuses
Fun Paper Chain Octopus Crafts
Kids love making chains and they are perfect for the legs of octopuses.
What You Will Need:
Lots of strips of thin card
Glue
Guide:
Form the first strip of card into a ring by glueing the two ends together.
Wait for this to dry.
Wrap a second piece of card through the first ring and glue.
Repeat this process to create a chain.
Make the chain as long as you like and repeat this for 8 different legs.
You can then stick these legs to a body which could be a balloon, a cutout or an old bucket.
Sweetie Octopus
Crafty activities can also be tasty!
What You Will Need:
Strawberry laces
A big spherical sweet like a gobstopper or lots of softer sweets rolled onto a ball.
Guide:
Simply tie the strawberry laces around the body to create fun sweets, perfect for parties!
Plastic Bottle Octopus
Your kids will love to make these easy sustainable plastic bottle crafts. By reusing a plastic bottle you are preventing it from going into the ocean.
What You Will Need:
Plastic bottle
Paints
Guide:
Help your kids by cutting the top of the bottle off and turn the bottom of the bottle upside down to use as the body.
Paint this whatever fun colour you wish.
Use any sustainable and crafty material as the eight legs. For example, the paper chain legs above!
Paper Bowl Octopus Crafts
Your kids will love making these easy cardboard bowl activities.
What You Will Need:
White cardboard bowl
Paint
Colourful strips of tissue
Guide:
Paint the white cardboard bowl and paint on some eyes
Stick on eight colourful strips of tissue so that they dangle from the bowl like legs.
Craft Octopus Silhouettes
Your kids will love these easy crafty silhouette activities!
What You Will Need:
Black card
Guide:
Make card cutout of octopuses.
Stick them to your wall or window to create some really stylish crafty decorations that your kids will love.
Ice Lolly Stick Octopus Crafts
If your kids love ice lollies then you'll probably have lots of ice-lolly sticks about.
What You Will Need:
Thin card
Eight ice lolly sticks
Guide:
Cut a semi-circle out of the card
Stick the eight ice lolly sticks to the bottom of the semi-circle
The Alphabet Craft
Create the letter O and give it eight fun crafty legs!
What You Will Need:
Card
Guide:
Cut the letter O out of the card.
Cut out 8 wobbly legs and glue them to the letter O!
Ocean Theme Sea Shell Octopus Crafts
If you have old shells lying about the house you can create some easy and fun octopus artwork that your kids will love.
What You Will Need:
Shells and any other coastal related crafty items.
Guide:
Using shells and any other coast related crafty items, your kids can stick them down on a piece of card to make pictures of octopuses.
Pom-Pom Octopus Crafts
Using a pom-pom craft as the body and pipe cleaners as the legs, you can make fantastic pom-pom octopus crafts.
What You Will Need:
Pom-poms
Pipe cleaners
Googly eyes
Superglue
Guide:
Wrap four pipe cleaners around one pom-pom to create eight legs
Superglue this to keep in place (Parents should help their kids with this for safety)
Now super glue on the googly eyes.
Crafty Footprint Activities
One of our favourite activities. Get your feet messy and create some fun octopus footprints!
What You Will Need:
Child-friendly, easy washable paint
Cardboard
Guide:
Get your feet all messy with paint.
Using both your feet, press down on the piece of cardboard. Your toes will be the legs!
You can paint on some fun eyes to the body to really bring your crafty octopuses alive!
Fabric Octopus Crafts
Reusing old fabric to create an ocean animal is sustainable and the material makes really fun octopus legs!
Use scissors and an old t-shirt, or towel, to create the following:
30 cm by 30 cm square fabric
8 long strips of fabric
All the rest of the scraps torn up into smaller pieces of fabric
Guide:
Scrunch the smaller scraps of fabric into a ball and put into the middle of the square fabric.
Wrap the bigger piece of fabric around the scrunched up fabric to create a fabric ball.
Twist the end so the whole thing starts to look like a balloon, and tie a knot so the fabric doesn't fall out.
Tie the 8 long strips of fabric to this knot to create the 8 legs.
Draw on some eyes and a mouth and your octopus friend is complete!
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Bachelor of Arts specializing in Fine Art
Eleanor GustardBachelor of Arts specializing in Fine Art
As a lover of art and crafts since childhood, Eleanor moved to London from Bath to study for a Fine Arts degree from the Central Saint Martins, University of the Arts London. She enjoys exploring the city and visiting galleries in her spare time, and also loves outdoor adventures and travel. Eleanor is always on the lookout for new destinations to discover.
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