Many years ago I tried to make a tin can wind chime with Travis that failed spectacularly because I didn’t have a proper way to string them together. This was an update on that idea for Veronika, with a winter snowman twist!

I set out three cleaned and dried cans on a tray, and told Veronika we needed to cover them with white paint. Even more fun, we used homemade puffy paint!

I squirted a puddle of white glue onto our craft tray, then covered that with a layer of shaving cream. Mix it all up with a paint brush and start to paint the cans. Note: This is also a fantastic hack any time you need lots of white paint but don’t have much on hand.

Veronika absolutely loved this paint and was quite serious about applying it to one of the cans while I worked on the other two.

Once painted, we wanted to make them sparkly, so added some fake snowflake glitter. At this point I confess I questioned my sanity a little, because sticky puffy paint + fake snow sparkles = a spectacular mess. But she was having so much fun it was worth it!

While I set the cans aside to dry, she kept playing with leftover snow sparkles, puffy paint, and a spare can on the tray for a while.

I was pleasantly surprised with how fast the puffy paint dried. By the time she woke up from her nap, the cans were dry and it was time to turn them into a snowman.

I used hot glue to add tidbits from our craft bin onto pieces of magnet tape. We used pom poms for eyes, black buttons for, well, buttons, and pipe cleaner pieces in red and orange for the mouth and carrot nose, respectively. You’ll need two magnets to make the red pipe cleaner piece curve into a smile.

To attach the cans, I first made a hole in each with a hammer and nail. This isn’t difficult, but definitely a grown-up step.

Next, I used a length of floral wire, inserting down through one can, then through a second, and then looping it so it wouldn’t come back up out of the hole. This was a touch tricky, so we decided to call it a win and have a two can snowman instead of a three can one.

Now the magnet pieces will adhere right onto the tin cans, yes even through the puffy paint! As a final step, I twisted the top length of floral wire around our porch lamp outside so the tin snowman can dangle in the winter wind.