There is a pile of pine cones around our house that was becoming rather unwieldy.

Lately, the big thrill of a walk in the woods is the collection of anything cool that has fallen onto the trail – leaves from the trees, seed pods, acorns and one thing in particular – pine cones.

Knowing that eventually the tiny person would question what I had done with her extravagant collection of nature, I was in serious need of something majorly crafty and heavy into the use of said cones to get her thinking creatively, make some more cool holiday gear to throw in the boxes that need to get mail so very soon and to exponentially diminish the pile in the car port.

Then, the Green Hour newsletter dropped in my e-mail inbox last week with a brilliant solution – pine cone creatures.

This craft is a totally fun way to go for a great big hike, check out the funky little bits on the forest floor and make some au naturale holiday crafts that are both cute and fun. I also particularly like that it let us take advantage of the left over this-and-thats from recent crafting adventures that may have otherwise never found a good home.

So, really, all you need is some glue and a whack of things from nature.

We did find that most everything this time of year has to be collected and then spread out in a warm place to dry overnight – otherwise you are crafting with soggy cones.

Big pine cones – which are sort of hard to find – are easiest in terms of staying upright. But, the thin kind are more fun for creatures, in my opinion, because they already kind of look like creatures. We found that gluing them to a base (cardboard, those puffy stickers or bottle caps) made them more sturdy and easier to deal with. The other tip is to use tacky glue if you are doing these with older kiddos. Elmers doesn’t dry very fast and ends up to be a little frustrating when you are trying to get things to stick.

We used acorn tops for eyes, leaves and seed pods for wings. Then we also busted out the coloured feathers and pipe cleaners for a little extra pizzaz. Let your creativity run wild.

Several other crafty experiments also came out of this including sticking all sorts of nature leftover to big maple leaves and tying a string to the end to make a very pretty little natural tree ornament. We are also test driving a little pine cone tree forest. I’ll let you know how that turns out.

Anyway, these are good fun for kids and grandparents are sure to love these little gems so much they’ll earn a special place on the mantle.

So, hit the trail, collect some nature and turn it into some serious holiday cheer!