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Cherry Tree Project for President's Day

By Michelle Melnik February 16, 2011

Thank you, Michelle @ http://www.greenolivesandham.com/green_olives_ham/2011/02/cherry-tree-for-presidents-day.html for a simple project for President's Day!

We celebrate President's Day on February 21, but I thought that we would do a craft for President's Day on February 12, because that is Abraham Lincoln's Birthday.  I'm sure we'll do another one closer to February 22, which is George Washington's actual Birthday.

We decided to create a "cherry" tree as a way to honor the beautiful cherry blossoms in Washington.  Instead of cutting out cherry shapes, I thought we would try and make cherries using coins.  That way, we could talk about the President's, Abraham Lincoln on the penny, Thomas Jefferson on the nickel, Franklin D. Roosevelt on the dime, and George Washington on the quarter.

Supplies:

- Paper towel roll
- Brown paint
- Paint brushes
- Brown and green construction paper
- Coins
- Pink paint
- Glue

The first thing we did was cut the paper towel roll in half because we didn't want it so tall and then we can use the other half for another project.  My daughter painted the paper towel roll with brown paint. 

We traced my arm and hand (my daughter wanted to trace my arm and hand rather than me tracing hers).  Then we cut it out and glued it to the paper towel roll.

Even though I realize that you don't really see green on the cherry blossoms, I drew the top of the tree using green construction paper.  This was the only thing I could think to use with the coin cherries.

We then dipped the coins in pink paint and pressed them on the green part of the tree.  Of course, ideally I would have liked to see even a small portion of the president that is on each of the coins, but once we pressed the coin, and let it dry, the "cherries" look like they have an image of a tree.  I think they came out beautifully and were a great way to honor President's Day and learn about the president's on the coins.