If you’re looking for a way to help your kids’ imagination take wing—or just to fill an afternoon—take inspiration from our fine feathered friends. Birds lend themselves to enough crafts and games to fill a play date, birthday party, or even a week’s worth of at-home “summer camp” (and you might even learn something along the way). Here are some ideas that are fun for the whole flock.

Bird Crafts

Whether you create a bird out of anything from cookies to paper plates, or build a house or restaurant for a real live birdie, there’s a bunch of high-flying options to choose from.

Build A Bird Feeder
Make a rainbow out of different types of bird feed, you’ll attract a treasure trove of different types of birds, each drawn to their own favorite food. To learn how to make your own birdseed rainbow out of seeds, peanut butter, and cardboard, click here. You can also use the different types of seeds to create birdseed “paintings” or collages by gluing them onto paper in patterns or designs.

Cardboard cutouts of letters, slathered in peanut butter, spread with seeds, and hung from trees are food for birds and decor for your yard. You can spell whatever you like—I Do for a shower, HBD for a birthday, or FUN for a barbeque.

Bird Feeder Basics

Here’s what you need to make your own bird buffet.

1. Twine 2. Peanut butter 3. Scissors 4. Sesame seeds 5. Sunflower seeds 6. Birdseed Mix 7. White Millet 8. Nyjer 9. Cracked Corn

Shop different seeds to make our rainbow.

You can also make bird feeders by spreading peanut butter on pretty much anything and covering it with bird seed. Try:

—Paper towel rolls
—Pine cones
—Egg cartons
—Milk or juice cartons
—Popsicle sticks
—Emptied out fruit rind
—An old soda bottle
—A teacup and saucer

Build a Birdhouse
While a birdfeeder provides food or water, birdhouses provide pied-a-terres where birds can rest, nest, and, for those birds who eat insects and berries, a place to snack. There are so many cute ones to buy or make. Try crafting one by
—Decorate a Pre-Made One. Buy a simple wooden birdfeeder and paint it, glue on patches, pennies, or sequins or bedazzle it in another way
—Build One Yourself. You can make it out of plywood, an old drawer, box, planter or shutter or even popsicle sticks
—Hollow out a gourd. Fill the hole with birdseed, then hang from a tree.

Build a Bird Paradise
Pick a part of your yard or balcony to turn into a bird playground and then DIT (Do It Together)!
—Set Out Water. That can be a birdbath, a birdfeeder, a pie pan, or even a teacup. Place it in a shady spot and one your cat can’t reach, fill it up to 2 inches and replace it every few days.
—Grow Native Plants. You can find out which ones local birds enjoy by entering your zip code at this Audubon database.
—Offer Nest Fixings. Provide a collection of natural materials birds can use to build nests with: bark twigs, moss, leaves.

Build a Bird!
There are so many things you can turn into a bird! Think about:

—Construction paper: Trace your hand, then draw on feet and color in your finger “feathers”
—Brown paper bags: Turn one into a bird puppet (the bottom is the bird’s head, your hand goes in the opening)

Darcy Miller Designs, Scrapbox

—Paper plates: One of my favorite projects my daughter made in an art class—which I loved so much I framed it—is Mr. Whoo Whoo, this cute owl she created out of three paper plates, plus feathers and paint (for a how-to on how to make and display him, click here.)
—Pine cones: Glue feathers or paper to a pine cone “bird body”
—Egg cartons: Attach feather, paper, stickers and more
—Socks: Sew or glue buttons, feathers and other bits and bobs to socks to create a bird puppet
—Pipecleaners: Twist them into birds
—Clay or playdough: Mold them into bird sculptures
—Shrinky Dink sheets: Cut and color different types of birds, then bake to shrink and turn them into charms for a bracelet
—Cookies: Use cutters or knives to shape into birds before baking
—Milano cookie: Add accessories (cut out of paper) to turn these into penguins (find a how-to here)

Bird Games

Sure, they can play a little bit of Angry Birds—but you don’t want kids on their device all day! For non-screen time games, a little bit of bird knowledge can lead to a whole lot of fun.