How to Make Simple Egg Carton Ocean Animals

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These egg carton ocean animals crafts are perfect for summertime! Decorate recycled egg cartons and turn them into cute sea creatures.

Summer is a great time to learn about the ocean. Many families are making plans to visit a beach for their summer vacation. Other, like me, are just dreaming about it.

Whether you’re dreaming about the ocean or planning to make a trip to one, your little ones will love creating this fun ocean animals from egg cartons.

Egg Carton Ocean Animals

Typically, we buy eggs in styrofoam cartons, but recently, I brought home a cardboard egg carton. Then, my five-year-old nephew came for a visit.

I brainstormed for an idea to entertain Isaiah one afternoon, and we came up with egg carton ocean animal crafts. We had almost all the supplies on hand, and I picked up the rest at the dollar store.

What you’ll need:

cardboard egg carton
paint
paint brushes
googly eyes
pipe cleaners
constructions paper
buttons, beads, and pom poms

These egg carton ocean animal crafts are perfect for summertime! Decorate recycled egg cartons and turn them into cute sea creatures.

I scoured Pinterest for inspiration, and then I drew the animal parts free-handed. I wasn’t too worried about the outcome of each animal as long as Isaiah was having fun.

And, he did! He worked for hours over the course of a few days to make his creatures (pictured below).

A few tips…

I cut apart the egg carton before having Isaiah paint the cups.

After the cups were dry, I trimmed some of them to take off the rougher edges.

We discovered that liquid glue works better than glue sticks.

Isaiah loved the self-adhesive googly eyes instead of gluing them on.

When he was done creating the animals I had in mind, he got creative! He went to town creating his own collection of sea monsters. Aren’t they adorable!

Ocean Books for Preschoolers

Fill your book basket with a great collection of ocean books for preschool. Most of these books can be found at your local library or used bookstore.

If you have a hard time finding them, you can order them through my Amazon affiliate links by clicking the images below.

Commotion in the Ocean – This delightful collection of poems includes fun rhymes about the creatures who live in and around the ocean. Children will delight in the snappy poems and colorful illustrations about whales, walruses, penguins, polar bears, stingrays, and sharks.

Over in the Ocean in a Coral Reef – This coral reef is a marine nursery, teeming with mamas and babies! In the ageold way of kids and fish, children will count and clap to the rhythm of “Over in the Meadow” while puffer fish “puff,” gruntfish “grunt” and seahorses “flutter.”

Ocean: A Peek Through Book – Discover a world teeming with life beneath the waves, with graceful sea horses, darting tropical fish, electric eels, and humpback whales.