20-Minute Crafts: Beading
Busy grownups generally appreciate quick ideas for kids to be creative. In20-Minute Crafts, part of Kathie Stull's Hand-On Crafts for Kids series, parents learn they can provide a few general supplies like foam sheeting, wooden cutout shapes, craft sticks, paints, Styrofoam balls, and chenille stems, then let youngsters go to town constructing an assortment of useful and just-for-fun projects. Masks, frames, fans, pencil toppers, decorative magnets, holiday and party decorations, and many other kid-friendly ideas abound. The volume could have used better organization: the table of contents is bewildering, and there is no immediately discernible sequence of projects. The overtly commercial angle is a bit off-putting too: each project is "sponsored" by a major craft manufacturer, though the materials lists do call only for generic supplies. Also, the book claims to be geared to 7- to 12-year-olds, but most kids at the upper part of this age range will consider themselves too sophisticated for most of these projects. Younger ones, however, will probably enjoy them, and even a well-coordinated 5-year-old can handle many of them with adult supervision.--Amy Handy--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.