Today we spotted a fire engine parked up at the supermarket. The kids were so excited we headed over to get a closer look at it and take some photos. After checking it out, we got inspired to try and make our own fire trucks at home.
When we got home we looked at the fire engine photos I took and talked about what fire trucks need and why.
We also talked about the colours used on the fire engine.
The kids noticed that the colour of the truck was red, black, silver, and yellow. They noticed there where lots of different objects on the fire truck that you don’t normally see on other vehicles, like lights and stripes. We also talked about the ladders and hoses.
We did some quick research on Pinterest and decided to make an egg carton fire truck because we had enough egg cartons to go around.
Then we looked through our craft supplies and decided what else we could use to make our own egg carton fire trucks.
Kids love to investigate and explore and these learning opportunities are such a great way to get your kids to observe and develop a deeper understand of the world around them.
When your kids are excited about seeing something it’s such an opportune moment to fuel that interest and excitement. I could have just let seeing that fire truck end in that moment (which is fine of course) but I wanted to encourage their curiosity and take it a little further.
Here’s how we made our egg carton fire trucks.
Egg Carton Fire Truck
What you need
Egg cartons
Paint we used Resene test pots in Glitterbug, Candy Floss, So Cool and Jaguar
Paint brushes
Craft iceblock sticks
Craft match sticks
Pompoms
2 Pipe Cleaners
Long skinny beads (we found some silver ones we thought looked like the end of a hose)
A glue gun and glue stick, or you could use a strong craft glue
Yellow and black permeant marker or felt
Black paper
What to do
1. Chop just over half way off the top of the egg carton. Just enough so it looks like you have the front of the cab of the fire truck still attached.
2. Next get the children to paint the top, the inside and the sides of their egg cartons. I chose not to be super fussy with how my kids painted them. My Mr 3 painted his in Candy Floss and Mrs 5 painted it in Glitterbug. I wanted them to have full ownership of their work and I know when I step in I’m taking away from their own experience. Set the egg carton aside to dry (or you could use a blow drier to speed up the process).
3. Using So Cool paint your matchsticks and iceblock sticks ready for the ladder. Set aside to dry.
4. Cut out four black paper circles for the wheels. Alternatively you could use milk bottle tops for wheels. We didn’t because we didn’t have enough to go around. You could also glue small white pompoms on as hubcaps.
5. To make the hose, stick your bead on the bottom of your first pipe cleaner. Then twist your two pipe cleaners together.
6. When your ladder pieces are dry, use your glue gun to glue the match sticks to the ice-block sticks. Depending on the age of your children you may like to help them with the hot glue gun or do it for them.
7. When your fire truck is dry, glue on the four wheels, glue 1-3 pompoms on for the siren and lights, glue your ladder on, and then twist the hose around the back of the egg carton.
8. To make the silver roller doors tape down the back of about 14 match sticks, trim the tape and then paint them in So Cool.
9. Colour in an iceblock stick with a yellow marker, then write on it ‘New Zealand Fire Service’.
10. Using black paint or black paper, cut out or paint some windows for the sides of your truck and for the front window screen.
11. Lastly glue on the silver roller door and the Fire Service sign. We also put some yellow pompoms on the side because we noticed the fire truck had yellow and red stripes running around it.
My daughter decided to make a little firefighter person out of pompoms and pipe cleaners, which was awesome! My son followed suit and made a pompom head person with one eye, very cool!
For literally hundreds more crafting ideas, check out our Creative Arts and Crafts section.
