As a mom of 2 young kiddos, I have no shortage of art work. A lot of our art gets recycled, but the handprint art always gets saved or turned into a handprint snail mail card for Grandma. Here are 34 adorable handprint art ideas for kids. This list includes everything from farm animals to holidays and everything in between. There is even a cactus handprint on this list!
Handprint Crafts for Kids
This list of handprint crafts includes everything from Christmas and Hanukkah art ideas to different types of birds made from handprints and footprints! It’s an all-inclusive list for hours of crafty keepsakes.
Animal handprints
1. Horse
Kristin turned a simple brown handprint into a horse with a few black paint lines.
2. Cow
Scarlet turned a white handprint into a cow by adding some spots with finger paint.
3. Giraffe
Turn a yellow handprint into a giraffe with a few brown spots. Find more details at Activity Village.
4. Zebra
Add black lines with a permanent marker to a white handprint to make a zebra! Find more at Crafty Crafted.
5. Panda
Paint the fingers black and the palm white for this cute Panda handprint. Add the face and ears with a black permanent marker after the handprint dries. Panda handprint found via Pinterest.
6. Lion
This lion is made with a golden footprint and brown finger prints. Cute! Find the details at Easy Preschool Craft.
7. Dinosaur
Add a tail and legs with green paint to a green handprint for a dinosaur. More details at Crazy Crafter.
8. Mouse
Add to giant ears to a grey handprint for a mouse! Don’t forget the eyes and nose. For more details check out Mommy Minutes.
Handprint Birds
9. Swan
Two white handprints wrist to wrist make for sweet swan art. Find more swan handprint details at Kissed by a Frog.
10. Duck
Turn yellow handprints into cute ducks. See more at Adventures of Mommy Hood.
11. Robin
Turn a brown footprint into a robin with a red belly, orange beak, and stick legs. Find more at Sweet and Simple Things.
12. Chicken
The chicken handprint art is as easy as a white handprint with a few red embellishments and yellow feet.
13. Ostrich
Find more details at Mommy’s Baby Love.
14. Penguin
Turn a black footprint into a penguin and make baby penguins with white finger prints! See more at Kissed by a Frog.
15. Peacock
Use four blue handprints to form the feathers. After that dries use a darker blue footprint to make the peacocks body. Add finer print dots in yellow, green, and blue to decorate the feathers. See more from Lila at Sweet and Lovely Crafts.
16. Parrot
Water Creature handprints
Grab a sheet of blue butcher paper and make an under the sea mural with lots of kids an their handprints!
17. Gold fish
Find more craft ideas at Mommy’s Baby Love.
18. Crab
Use two handprints to make this adorable crab at Snails and Puppy Dog Tails. I love that they used real sand under the crab too!
19. Lobster
The lobster art utilizes hand and footprints! So cute! Find more at Mommy’s Baby Love.
20. Octopus
Find more at Jenwa.
Insect handprints
And footprints! Both of the insects on this list are made from footprints!
21. Grasshopper
Find more at Pick Ease.
22. Bumble bee
Use a yellow foot print and a permanent marker to add wings, stripes, antenna, and a give your bumble bee footprint a face! Find more details at Mamas Many Loves.
Holiday handprint art
23. Pumpkin
24. Spider
Find the spider handprint tutorial at Housing a Forrest.
25. Reindeer
Turn any kiddo into Rudolph with 2 brown handprints and a red pom pom nose! See more examples at Little Illuminations.
26. Christmas tree
This Christmas tree handprint idea is a great family craft. Find more details at Sheaffer Told Me To.
27. Santa Claus
Use a white handprint as a Santa’s beard and add red construction paper for Santa’s hat. Finally, use paint for skin color and add 2 black dots for eyes and a smile!
28. Snowman
Turn a white footprint into snowman art with a washi tape scarf, marker arms and a construction paper carrot nose.
29. Heart
Turn two red handprints into a heart! Find the heart handprint art tutorial at Rosy Posy.
30. Canadian flag
Canada Day is July 1st and celebrates this Canadian flag handprint craft is the perfect for way to celebrate with the little ones in your life. Find the full tutorial at YMC.
31. Menorah
Celebrate Hanukkah with a cute handprint menorah complete with golden glittered candle fingerprints! See more details at Littles Learning Lounge.
Nature inspired handprint art
32. Cactus
Use a green handprint and add black marker cactus spines and yellow flowers.
33. Sunshine
Find the tutorial at Nifty Mom.
34. Flower
These flower handprint tote bags are perfect for Mother’s Day! Find the tutorial at Nifty Mom.
35. Sunflower
Use multiple yellow handprints, and then finger paint brown in the center. See more at Arts and Crackers.
Comments & Reviews
These are great! A bunch I ahve not seen before, like the dinosaur and monkey.
Yep – the monkey is a favorite for sure!
Oh my gosh, this would keep the kids busy for hours! Pinned & stumbled!
Thanks for all the wonderful ideas out there by such creative Moms and Teachers
awsome project for kid, love it!!
I clicked on the robin for directions but I keep getting the hedgehod directions. Help!
Thanks for letting me know… I fixed it!
I have done candy corn at Halloween time using handprints. I have also done the face of a pilgrim and indian and the mayflower at Thanksgiving time.
A cute christmas one (sorry I don’t have a pic) but you use one footprint and both hands to make a reindeer. 🙂
Thank you so much for linking my eagle handprint to this post!
You’re welcome, Lolo!
Here is one that I made with my little girl for St. Paddy’s day! Printable also available.
http://squishycheeksandcupcakes.blogspot.com/2013/03/diy-lucky-wall-art.html
Love it! Thanks for sharing, Jenn!
What a super roundup! Always love these pieces of art!
Oh my gosh, this would keep the kids busy for hours! Pinned & stumbled!
I just made a crawfish handprint that I found online for my daughter! I just googled handprint and crawfish, so cute!
thank God for letting me know, awsome handprint art ideas 🙂
I just made some cute cushions with my girls – check out at http://rachaelrabbit.blogspot.com/2013/03/mothers-day-pillows.html
Thanks for sharing, Rachael! I love the handprint bouquets!
we made easter chicks one here, they turned out so cute – http://momvstheboys.com/2010/03/thats-one-cute-chick/
I have my boys’ bathroom decorated in dinosaurs and would LOVE to do the dinosaur art but can’t seem to find the picture on here?
I fixed it, Jen!
These hand prints are darling and, I’m sure, are great fun for kids to do. When I taught kindergarten many years ago, I did a yearly calendar using my student’s hand prints to illustrate each month. Gathered up several kindergarten parents to do the messy work with the children while I worked with children on reading and writing. Hey, my mom helpers had as much fun as the children and were, from then on, eager to volunteer for other projects.
Louisa: Best paint is for u to find a big stamp at a craft store n use that instead of paint less messy too, not very expensive either. If you work at a school they might have a book u could order it out of too
I love these Am gonna buy a inkpad n start with my 6 month old n 11 yr old Girl
These are all great ideas! What is the best paint to use for a wiggly kid???
You have SAVED my life! I work at a special needs school and have a class with little ones who are very limited in their abilities, but, they all have hands and feet! So guess what we’ll be making as a class contribution to the Christmas market day? Thanks so much xxx with love from South Africa.
You’re welcome!
I have a cute crawfish on my pinterest page- the kid’s foot is the body, and their hands are the claws. Thanks for the great ideas. We made the “owl” picture tonight!
Hiya Jamie,
Some really inspiring ideas here, thank you. When I first looked at your site last week I found a great page with a hand print calendar on it. It’s a daft question but I can’t remember where that page is now… where is it please.
Thank you
Tim
Tim, It was probably featured on a Monday for M.M.M., I just did a little google and found one that looks really cute! http://littlegiraffes.com/teaching-ideas/257/handprint-calendar/
I made airplanes with the kids feet! They turned out cute. The heel was the propeller and then just added the wings
Sounds awesome! I’d love to see a picture 🙂
i love all of these! we do the orginial works and this will come in handy for some of the teachers!!! thank you! my son loves to paint with his hand print! also you can make a wreath w/berries for the a Christmas gift for the parents!
Hi–Thanks for posting these adorable prints!! The only one I can suggest was done at my child’s school. They took long pieces of paper and measured out the height of the child and painted a green line that length. Then they did yellow handprints in a circle to form a flower–like a sunflower. Then they did green footprints for the leaves along the long stem. There was a caption something like “See how I’ve grown in 3rd grade this year” I don’t have a photo or link, but I’m sure you can figure this one out.
What a fun idea! I’d love to see pictures 🙂
On my pinterest site there is a board for hand & footprint pictures with some really cute pictures. Check it out. These are so much fun!
Fun! I’ll definitely check it out!
We made “vans” this year for father’s Day cards- First they glued a grey “road” with yellow dashes for the lines. print the hand on its side with the thumb on top, fingers all together.Used a cork to stamp the wheels, the children drew their dad driving on a little piece of paper “window” that they glued on. Sun and clouds (cotton balls) were added to the background. Worked great!
Great ideas on this sight….http://eisforexplore.blogspot.com/2012/01/abc-handprints.html
I have a guest bathroom and the decor is ocean and I have wanted to incorporate my grandkids into it somehow and this is the best idea. Thank you so much.
all of them are very adorable…
What cute projects! Thanks for sharing!!!
You’re welcome! They are ALL such cute projects!