Quick Butterfly Craft from magazine pages


I thought I would write a post on a very easy and simple butterfly craft you can do with your children. All you need are scissors, magazines, a pipe cleaner, and fishing line (optional). At the time of this writing a Butterfly Blog Hop just went live at Plain Vanilla Mom and I wanted to submit this tutorial. You all should hop on over there and see what other ideas people came up with pertaining to butterflies.

I like this project because:
  1. Children of all ages love it  
  2. It reuses magazines that might otherwise be tossed  
  3. It requires minimal preparation.
Children under 5 may need one-on-one assistance in helping with the folding and the cutting.
First have the children choose 2 magazine pages to use. I encourage them to look for pages that are brightly colored, or that have an interesting repeating pattern.
On the Paper #1 (the bottom set of wings) fold the paper in half. With scissors cut the corners so they are nice and rounded.
On Paper #2 (the top set of wings) Fold a triangle down and cut bottom strip, so that when it is unfolded it is a square.
When the pages are unfolded they should look like this.
Take Paper #1 and make an accordian fold going all the way up to the top of the paper.
 On paper #2 turn the paper diagonal and fold as shown.

I like to fold the resulting folded papers in half so I know where the center point is on each.
This is so easy! I like to attach a short length of fishing line to the butterflies with a loop on the other end so that the kids can "fly" them on the playground. This craft is always a big hit!

Thanks for coming by and checking this out. Remember to "like" me on my Facebook Page if you want to stay informed of more kid craft ideas I post or find around the blogosphere!
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7 comments:

  1. Oh, so glad you linked this up! I saw your post earlier today. Love it :) What a creative and beautiful butterfly!

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  2. What a beautiful butterfly :) I love it and I think my girls would too
    Thanks for sharing on this week's Kid's Co-op

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  3. love it, thanks so much for sharing on Craft Schooling Sunday!

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  4. I love this so much! So quick and simple, and oh so beautiful! Your tutorial is so clear as well. I've featured it as one of my favourites from last weeks Kid's Co-op link up. Thanks for linking up!

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  5. Lovely butterfly!! We'll try it at home! Thanks for sharing

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  6. I featured this on my bug activities post. Great idea!

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  7. Lovely. I loved this butterfly. Have to try it at home

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