Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness and self-control, who wouldn’t want their kids to exhibit these attributes? It’s a beautiful thing to watch our kids show love to others, but sometimes life looks messier than how Facebook portrays. It’s a daily, purposeful quest to live focused and free. So when I can make a craft that helps encourage attributes that I am aiming for, I am all in. I wanted to share a simple little craft about the fruits of the Spirit that I used to help encourage a spark in my kids to do the right things, and hopefully, you will also find value in it too!

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law.

Galatians 5:22-23

Spoiler alert… I am not going to promise you more than what this is. This is a craft. It’s not a life changer, but hopefully, it will give your family spritzes of moments to reflect on things that are of value. Honestly, no matter how hard we try and strive for our kids to seek better, live better, love with pure intent, it is an unsustainable goal apart from the love of Christ.

Our kids have to be connected to the Vine just as much as we do; to the One who rewires our heart to love others greater than we do ourselves.  So my task is not just to encourage my kids to do a kind deed here or there, but to get an entire heart overhaul as they allow Jesus to shine through them. My hopes are that these outward displays are a reflection of a deeper heart change.

Apart from Me (Christ), you can do nothing.

John 15:5

Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.

Proverbs 22:6

Fruit of the Spirit Craft

Supplies:

• Variety felt pack
• Art canvas (whatever size you want, I would suggest at least 11″x14″)
• Staple gun
• Large sheet of light colored felt
• Fabric scissors

Instructions

1. Make a felt board.

I bought an art canvas and some light-colored felt, wrapped felt tight around art canvas, and turned it upside down. I then used a staple gun the felt to tack the felt to the canvas. Super simple. Super quick.

Here is the step-by-step tutorial I used – Felt board.

Front of the felt board

Back of the felt board

2. Cut out the shapes.

Then I cut out little leaves and a tree. These can pretty much be any shape you like. I found that cutting felt is a pain with regular scissors, especially if they are dull. I used my sharpest scissors in the house and they worked well. If you have fabric scissors that would work best.

3. Test it out.
You can get a sneak peek how the final craft will look by putting the leaves on your tree. I really enjoyed the final look of this craft!

4. Share with the kids, and look for opportunities to add leaves to your tree!
The goal of this tree is to highlight the fruits of the Spirit that were being demonstrated in your home. I hope you enjoyed it as much as we did!

Some fun activities to do with the tree

• What my family liked to do was assign each kid a colored leaf. Anyone in the family could place a leaf for each other on the tree when they saw someone displaying a fruit of the spirit. You could choose to offer incentives for their kind acts or let their kind act be the reward :)
• Another option is assigning each fruit of the spirit with a different color to see what strengths your family carries.
• Or perhaps you want to do away with the color separation and just add a leaf to your tree when you see someone do a fruit of the Spirit and just work collectively. Whatever way you decide I know this will be a fun craft for your family!

I would love to see pictures of your tree in the comment section and any fun ideas you decided to do while teaching your kids the value attributes of the fruit of the Spirit!