This cardboard gingerbread house is a process art activity that helps kids create and build fine motor skills with a gingerbread house theme! Pair this with our decorate a gingerbread house Google slide deck for hands-on fun that the kids will love this holiday season.
It was really easy and Big Sister and Little Guy played with it for a long time. The creating part lasted a while when the babies were sleeping. Sleeping Beauty looooves her new house 😉
To make it, I cut up a box into enough pieces, just eye-balling the size. No need for measuring. The kids don’t notice and you never know when a superhero might accidentally destroy the house 😉
How to make a cardboard gingerbread house
Little Guy wanted me to use his special red duct tape.
To easily get the house shape, lay the tape on one piece then stick the corner piece onto the strip of tape.)
You can make a row of four squares then close up the last shape by putting the tape on from the inside.
After all the seams are taped up, turn the whole thing upside down. You don’t need a floor…so princesses and superheros can get in a little easier…
Tape the triangle roof pieces on.
Make the cardboard gingerbread house roof
Then, cover with two more squares for a roof. I pulled one side of the cardboard off for a shingled look.
To tape the roof on, work from the inside and tape one roof side on first by taping the inside edges.
Then, stick tape to the edge of the other side of the triangle. Slightly bend the long piece of tape and place the other cardboard roof piece ontop so it sticks to the bent tape.
It looks cute, I think 🙂 Spiderman really liked his new home.
Decorate the cardboard gingerbread house
After it was built, I pulled out a bag of mixed crafting materials and a ton of glue.
Big Sister had so much fun. She went crazy gluing stuff on.
It was a lot like our process vs. product play activity.
Use colored tape, beads, craft pom poms, pipe cleaners, tissue paper, crepe paper, and other craft materials to decorate the cardboard gingerbread house.
We had a fun day with our Candy-less Gingerbread House…but Little Guy said needed a little bit of candy to east while he was helping to build it. “You have to eat a Gingerbread house, Mom!”
We are having so much fun with our Christmas Play activities…Check out the new tab at the top for all of the 25 Days of Christmas Play that we’ve done so far.
Colleen Beck, OTR/L has been an occupational therapist since 2000, working in school-based, hand therapy, outpatient peds, EI, and SNF. Colleen created The OT Toolbox to inspire therapists, teachers, and parents with easy and fun tools to help children thrive. Read her story about going from an OT making $3/hour (after paying for kids’ childcare) to a full-time OT resource creator for millions of readers. Want to collaborate? Send an email to contact@theottoolbox.com.
