Landon loves music. He’ll turn anything into a drum, loves to listen to and participate in any music opportunities. He’s broken several drum sticks and about as many maracas that were turned into drum sticks.
Materials
Balloon (smaller sized)
Dried beans
Newspaper (or any scrap paper)
White Glue
Water
We took several days to make his very own maraca. This was a total spur of the moment activity and the only balloons we had were the 16 inch party balloons. Go big or go home right? Normally I would use a much smaller balloon.
First, we filled the balloon with the beans. Landon did most of them! This is great fine motor and hand eye coordination practice.
Then blow the balloon up. Landon tried. Hard. The result was a very slobbery balloon with a few teeth punctures at the end. Maybe next time!
Mix equal parts of glue and water in a small container and saturate newspaper (or the huge pile of shredding that needs to be done anyway!) and cover the balloon. Make sure it overlaps well and that you’re not able to see any balloon through the newspaper. After it dries you might need to patch some holes.
Once it’s all dry, pop the balloon inside, patch the hole from popping it and paint to your hearts content. I asked Landon what colors he wanted – put those on his plate then he proceeded to mix them all up! It made a “nice” sage green color. 
If you had a smaller balloon and wanted to make an actual “maraca”, you could tape a toilet paper tube to the bottom and paper meche it on. I don’t think it would be very 3 year old durable, but it might be worth a shot!