This cute cat perler bead craft for kids is based on the adorable Zoey & Sassafras book series.
Late last year, our family got into perler bead crafting and have been enjoying making all sorts of creations. Most of which, my youngest will take with him everywhere, like to the playground or to bed.
This Sassafras the cat perler bead craft for kids is his new favorite to take to the park and is inspired by our favorite new chapter book series for kids called Zoey and Sassafras.
This post contains affiliate links. I was provided a copy of the first book from the Zoey and Sassafras Series from The Innovation Press in exchange for an honest review, but we loved it so much we had to buy the rest of the books in the series. And we're definitely preordering future books in the series!
About the Zoey & Sassafras Series
Parenting a toddler and preschooler with hyperlexia quickly taught me that there is a serious lack of good quality chapter books geared towards early readers.Let's face it: those early readers are JUNK. You know which ones I'm talking about. The ones with zero plot and so much rhyming and repetition that it makes you want to rip the book to shreds. Okay, maybe not rip them because I can't even handle a page corner being bent or the spine having creases.
But seriously, I searched high and low for any kind of chapter book to fill J's need to devour chapter books as a preschooler, only to turn up empty handed and disappointed. Either the chapter books focused on content that J wasn't developmentally ready for or they had plot lines as interesting as a beige wall.
There just simply wasn't any chapter books for early readers that appealed to my hyperlexic son.
Until Zoey and Sassafras came out.
I seriously wish these books existed years ago because they were exactly what I had been searching for for J when he was younger. They're fun and educational, mixed with quirky and lovable characters. And the plots do not suck. Seriously, go toss out all of those early readers now and swap them for Zoey and Sassafras.
There are currently three books available, but with a fourth on the way. We can't wait to scoop up the fourth book when it comes out!
Now, K, my youngest, is five, almost six, and was an early reader too. He started reading at age two, just like his older brother, and he was definitely the only kid in all the kindergarten classes this year who could read. So he could easily read the Zoey and Sassafras books all by himself.
His favorite part of the series though has been Sassafras the cat. He talks about Sassafras non-stop. He asks questions about Sassafras all the time. He is one step away from asking, "What would Sassafras do?" when making any kind of decision.
So naturally, I had to make some kind of Sassafras toy for him to play with. Thankfully, he loves to create perler bead crafts with me so we worked together to design and create this super cute Sassafras the cat perler bead craft.
Perler Bead Craft for Kids: How to Make Sassafras the Cat
To make your own Sassafras the cat out of perler beads, you'll need:
- Perler beads in orange, white, brown, and blue
- Perler bead pegboard
- Perler bead ironing paper
- Iron
Place a sheet of ironing paper over top of the completed design and run a warm iron over top of the paper until the beads start to melt and fuse together. Carefully flip the creation over and cover the backside with some ironing paper. Melt the backside with a warm iron.
Then when the beads are melted and still warm, I like to place a stack of textbooks on top to make sure the design stays flat. Once cool, the kids can play with it. Or add a magnet to the back to place it on your fridge. It's up to you! K just prefers to hang out with his new buddy and take it with him wherever we go.
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