One thing being a mother of two kids teaches me—repeatedly—is that just because they’re both mine doesn’t mean they’re the same. Or even similar. For example, Peeper could paint, glue, color and craft forever. Kiwi, on the other hand, will eat paint for a moment then splatter it everywhere before getting down from her chair, leaving a trail of purple and orange in her wake.

So the other day during Kiwi’s nap, I suggested Peeper and I do a craft together. We opted for something new and different—after all, when you have so few uninterrupted opportunities to do a kids craft project, you want to make it count! So we brought all our upcycled supplies onto the deck and made egg carton faces in the rare Oregon springtime sun.

Bonding through crafting

Peeper and I both got very into crafting our egg carton faces. More than the project itself, though, I loved spending the one-on-one time with my older daughter.

Kiwi and Max get along pretty well these days. The sisters play doctor together or chase each other back and forth across the house, squealing with delight. But there’s often an element of competition—who can get more of Mom’s attention?

While Peeper and I made our egg carton faces, nothing else vied for my attention. I left my phone inside. Kiwi was peacefully sleeping. All we had to distract us was the wind, which kept blowing away our egg cartons and construction paper.

Proof that sisters aren’t the same

Toward the end of our second round of egg carton faces, Kiwi woke up. I brought her outside in the sunshine and set her up with a sheet of paper and a paintbrush.

“It doesn’t matter if she gets paint all over the deck,” I thought. “The rain that’s surely coming will wash it off.”

Well, Kiwi made exactly one swipe with her paintbrush. Then she ran over to the grill cover, which was lying on the deck, and jumped in the little puddles of rain water that had collected in it. Soon enough, she was sopping wet.

But that’s how she rolls. While Peeper is content to draw or read or cut dozens of tiny pieces of yarn in the interest of executing an idea, Kiwi is all-in with anything big, bold and messy.

There you go—there’s my daughters’ very different personalities in a nutshell.

Peeper and I may just make a whole wall of egg carton face portraits. They’re that fun! And with Easter and all its empty egg cartons coming up, we’ll have plenty of supplies.

We’ll just have to wait until Kiwi goes to sleep.

Egg carton faces craft

Supplies

• egg cartons
• glue
• construction paper
• scissors
• craft supplies for decorations, such as googly eyes, yarn, glitter or feathers

Instructions

1. With sharp scissors, carefully cut two egg carton cups, including the portion that sticks up vertically, from the rest of the egg carton.
2. Cut an oval of construction paper about 10 inches high and 4 inches across to make the face. You can also cut “ears” for the face.
3. Glue the egg carton cups near the center of the oval.
4. Using paint, yarn and any other craft supplies you like, decorate the face. (To make the green “hair” on mine, I spread a thin layer of white glue on the top quarter of the oval, then snaked a length of yarn back and forth.)
5. You could glue these onto a sheet of construction paper, then glue a brown border around the edge of the paper, to create a picture frame for your egg carton faces, too!

Have fun making your egg carton faces!