How to Make Homemade Walnut Shell Toys: Fairy Cradles

Homemade walnut shell toys are simple and harken back to days when we used whatever was at hand for our toys. I used to make playpens for my Barbie doll babies from mesh strawberry boxes – and of course, fairy cradles from walnut shells.

Homemade Walnut Shell Toys

I was standing near the compost bin yesterday cracking open a walnut, thinking happily that I needed to call Aunt Lucille and wish her a Happy Thanksgiving tomorrow. 

Then like a wave cresting over me, the sorrow hit again; I’d forgotten that she was gone. No more Thanksgivings with her, or Christmas.  Now, I haven’t shared a Thanksgiving dinner with her in years, having been co-opted by my in laws long before my move to Virginia.  She always ate Thanksgiving dinner at my eldest sister’s house and sometimes my eldest brother’s house on Long Island.  But still the same, as I picked walnut meat out of the shell, I thought sadly that she would not be here anymore.

But why think of her at that precise moment?  For a second I paused, holding the walnut shell between thumb and forefinger.  A hint of the laundry soap smell came over me, the scent of her long white dress, and bayberry candles.

Making Fairy Cradles

Suddenly I was four or five years old again. I was sitting at the long table in our dining room next to Aunt Lucille.  Dinner had been cleared, and we were the only two left at the table. The snowy white tablecloth was now mass of turkey gravy, cranberry, and butter dripping stains. Two bayberry-scented candles sputtered in the brass holders on the table.  From the living room I could hear the television set where my siblings, my parents and my grandmother were gathered, probably watching The Sound of Music or The Wizard of Oz – two movies that always seemed to be on the television for the holidays.

Aunt Lucille was showing me how to crack open a walnut.   “Please, can you crack it so that the shell is perfectly in half?” I begged.

“Well,” she said, “I’ll try.” And she did, handing me both smooth halves. “It’s a fairy cradle.”

“A what?”

She smiled.  “When they crack perfectly like that , we used to call them fairy cradles, and make tiny cradles out of walnut shells for our dolls. Walnut shell toys.”

“Like Thumbelina!”

“Exactly.”

Country Crafts and Making Homemade Toys

One of the pleasures of living in the country is ready access to natural materials from which to make all sorts of toys and decorations. Pine cones, holly boughs, evergreens all grow wild on my farm.

And I have learned over the years to recycle and reuse. For making crafts with small children who visit, nothing beats a few simple items: glue, crayons, paper, a bit of paint or glitter (if you’re feeling brave).

Fairy Cradles – Walnut Shell Toys

I remember running downstairs for glue and purple glitter, and generally making a total mess of the walnut shell, trying to make it a cradle for an imaginary fairy baby.

Here’s how to make a simple fairy cradle from walnut shells, a fun craft:

• Find a good walnut shell that is rounded
• Crack it in half
• Scoop out the middle and use the walnuts for walnut applesauce bread
• Use glue and glitter to decorate

You can use these for Barbies too, or other dolls, or simply imaginative play.

Simple Childhood Pleasures

I don’t remember anything else from that Thanksgiving dinner long ago, but somehow, standing in my kitchen in Virginia over 30 years later, just the smooth, cool feel of the walnut shell between my fingers sparked a memory lying dormant deep within my mind of my aunt.

Maybe this is our way of grieving.  Maybe these tiny fits and starts, these, “Oh, I have to call her! – oh wait, she isn’t here,” feelings are our way of keeping memory alive.  The mind links seemingly random things together, walnut shells and fairy cradles, Thanksgiving and beloved aunts, drawing forth the memory gently when we need it most to remember ones we love.