Doodle Crate is a member of the KiwiCo family geared toward kids 9+. It inspires young makers to learn new skills and gain creative confidence through craft and art projects by teaching them basic and intermediate techniques of a new artistic medium each month. The sky is the limit, and crafts made from the same kit can be kept simple, or they can be made as intricate as the artist desires.
Though geared toward kids, Doodle Crate is gender neutral and also excellent for anyone (even adults) wanting a craft subscription. In our experience, this is the best “arts and crafts” box for older kids, tweens, teens, and adults – the end result is nearly always something you will want to save!
DEAL: Use this link to save 30% on your first month of Doodle Crate! (or Kiwi Crate and the KiwiCo family subscriptions Tinker Crate and Eureka Crate).
This month’s project: BLOCK PRINTED CANVAS BIN!
All the items arrived in great condition!
Doodle Crate Instruction Book
Doodle Crate is inclined to focus on a single craft and contains only what you’ll be needing for the project.
The booklet has excellent textbook quality background on the subject matter of the project. Every Crate is a project and a lesson in technique – when you are finished, you should have a usable handcrafted item and a new skill.
Doodle Crate Materials
Every crate comes with everything you need to complete the project (except for a few basic items from your home), as well as a booklet.
Doodle Crate Activity
As usual, the booklet has an excellent textbook quality background on the subject matter of the project. Expect to learn a lot of techniques and useful skills at the end of each and every work.
This booklet is loaded with high-quality pictures and illustrations to provide you ideas and help you along at the same time. They also produce a video tutorial for each project, too.
Doodle Crate is great for providing perspective and inspiration for their projects, showing examples of the medium in real life settings. They also provide a step-by-step procedure, from start to finish, with detailed guidance the whole way. The numerous diagrams explain every step clearly and make it practically impossible to go off track.
Doodle Crate Materials
For the printing block project we will be needing a sheet of sticky foam, sticky foam shapes, spouncer, paint, arrow stickers, acrylic squares, and tray.
Once your done planning your design, the next step is to materialize it by creating your own printing block. Simply stick the sticky foam shapes on the tray based on the your planned design.
At every phase of the project, Doodle Crate presents several options to bring added personality to your work – and you are always free to do something completely original. After all, it is YOUR creation.
Test your printing block using this paper bin mock-up sheet.
Put the acrylic paint on the tray and using your spouncer brush, carefully scatter it on your printing block. Before trying it on the mock sheet, make sure that every part of the block contains a paint.
Press the board with weight evenly distributed on the sheet to get the best result possible. Repeat the procedure until you get the perfect groove. So great they let us practice first! You can build it up too. We skipped this part – but only because dad has done this crate before a few years ago!
Once you are done printing on the mock-up sheet, wait for around 30 minutes or until the paint is fully dry. Then assemble the sheet according to the shape of the bin to have a preview of the end product.
If the mock-bin looks good, then it’s time to work on the actual project.
First, lay the canvas properly until it looks like a letter H and make sure that the paint-side is on top.
Simply repeat what you did with the mock sheet. Pour on the paint on the tray, and using the spouncer brush, spread the it on the printing block.
Press the printing block on the canvas, repeat the procedure until you fully cover the canvas with your desired design and let the whole thing dry!
Time to build our tote! All the edges of the canvas features a hole in which you need to connect on the other side using the brad. Connect each of the hole until you form a box.
Once we were done with the actual bin, the next step is to create a support using a solid carton, glue, more brads, and binder clips.
Insert the supports alongside the canvass, press the short sides against the ends of your bin to cover and line-up the corners. Then push the bottom support down into the bin until it lies flat.
Add glue on the flaps of the canvass, fold it over on top of the support and press it down using the binder clips.
After gluing down all four sides, you need to make sure that the seams are flat along the top.
Our four year old was an eager participant in this craft too. He likes participating with his big brother. The adorable thing is that he built his own box, covered it with printer paper, and block printed it a couple weeks later – the kids really retain the techniques!
Our four year old added his mark to the bottom.
There we have our new printed canvas bin!
We just finished another fun and exciting project from Doodle Crate box! This month’s activity is pretty messy but truly enjoyable, it takes a lot of careful preparation, practice, and analysis to perfectly execute the project. This handmade Block Printed Canvas Bin activity brings a wide range of learning for my kids, from being creative to being patient with the whole process, since it took them almost a whole day to make it. What I love most about this box is that almost all the items are already provided, plus the instruction booklet was so detailed making the activity easier to finish. This subscription is really great for any kid or family who loves crafts!
Did you enjoy this month’s activity as much as we did? Let us know in the comments!
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