How to create a squirrel and hedgehog leaf craft

Autumn offers lots of opportunities to bring the outdoors in through your craft projects. By using natural materials such as leaves, conkers, nuts and seeds that are often in abundance during this time of year, you can create autumnal art that can be educational and of course, fun to make.

With the help of children's craft and creative play influencer, Creative Mama Che, follow our step-by-step guide to making a squirrel and hedgehog leaf craft.

Plus, you can download our hedgehog craft template or squirrel template for FREE to help make your animal leaf craft a little easier - particularly if this activity is for multiple children.

What you will need

FREE printable hedgehog template OR printable squirrel template (799.69 KB)
PVA white Glu
Blu Tack® in your colour of choice
OPTIONAL: Coloured pens
OPTIONAL: Googly eyes
OPTIONAL: Any other craft accessories

Difficulty

Average time

5-15 mins

Cost

Print version!

Instructions

Step 1: Print your FREE hedgehog printable template

Print your free squirrel template and hedgehog template on brown coloured paper. The brown paper will create a more realistic effect for the colour of your autumnal animals.

If you don't have brown paper to hand, grab the colouring pencils and get creative. Or, alternatively, this is your hedgehog and your squirrel - make them whatever colour you'd like!

Tip

Fancy going free hand? Creative Mama Che draws her hedgehog free-hand, adding a smiley face and blushed pink cheeks to her hedgehog masterpiece.

Step 2: Add glue to your hedgehog or squirrel

Gently squeeze the bottle of PVA and use the precision nozzle to direct the white glue into position on your squirrel or hedgehog craft template.

Step 3: Stick your leaves in place

Stick your first leaf in place onto the white blob of PVA glue and repeat steps 2 and 3 until your hedgehog or squirrel is fully covered in leaves.

Step 4: Glaze your leaves with PVA Glue and leave to dry

Bostik PVA white Glu is great for creating a varnish effect that can help protect artwork, giving it a longer lifespan, particularly when using old, dried leaves that could crumble with general wear and tear and temperature changes.

Plus, when PVA glue is applied to your leaves, it provides a beautiful, glossy effect that can make you’re artwork look more clean, crisp and professional.

Leave your hedgehog or squirrel to dry for approximately 3-5 minutes

Tip

Depending on how thick you applied your PVA, we recommend waiting 12 hours for the product to fully cure.

Step 5: Display on your wall with Blu Tack®

And that's it - your squirrel or hedgehog leaf craft is complete! Now that it is dry, you can stick up your masterpiece on the wall or anywhere else using Blu Tack®.

As your Blu Tack® will be on the back of the poster, you can choose whichever colour you like as it will be hidden out of sight. We recommend using the following colours of Blu Tack® for the following applications: