For the past few months now I have been hoarding away empty paper towel rolls. I had built up quite the collection and the sight of the rolls piled up on top of my kitchen cabinet was starting to give me hives. It was finally time to put them to some use. Mai and I have been on a craft frenzy this week. We made a mess, had a few tantrums & a few laughs and smiles too. Each of these crafts that we made uses one of our paper towel tube.
Paper Mache Maracas
What you will need:
Plastic Easter eggs (1 for each maraca made)
An empty paper towel roll cut in half or two toilet paper rolls
Uncooked chickpeas or dried beans
Newspaper
Glue
Water
Masking tape
Paint
Directions:
Fill each Easter egg with chickpeas or beans
Use one or two full pages of newspaper & wrap in around the chickpea filled Easter egg. Form it into a ball shape.
Tape the edges in place to hold the shape tightly.
Enlist the help of your favorite little crafter to tear up strips of newspaper for you.
In a bowl, mix 3/4 glue and 1/4 water to form your paper mache adhesive.
Dip a strip of the paper into your glue mixture.
Wrap your strip of paper around your ball shape smoothing it out carefully as you work it around.
After you receive a desired shape, allow it to dry & then place your ball on top of the paper towel tube halve.
Adhere the ball to the tube using masking tape & then cover the tape with more newspaper strips.
Continue to wrap your project with the paper strips and glue until you reach the desired shape. Make sure that all areas are smooth and that edges are not sticking up. Let it dry.
Paint the handles of your maracas first in the color of your choice and allow to dry.
Once dry, continue to paint the rest. You may now use the handle to hold on to while you paint.
Make beautiful music.
Mai thought these were rattles. As she was shaking them, she kept saying “Ooooooh, I’m a baby..so cute.”
Paper Towel Kaleidoscope
What you will need:
An empty paper towel roll
Colored beads
Thin plastic (I used old plastic packaging)
Heavy duty aluminum foil
Glue gun
Craft paper
Ribbon
Directions:
Cut out two pieces of plastic small enough to fit snuggly inside of the paper towel tube.
As deep in the tube as you can, use your glue gun and squeeze out a line of glue rotating until it meets the starting end.
Give it a few seconds to cool slightly and then press your plastic disk into the glue.
Pour the beads on top of the disk, leaving enough room for the beads to move around. Add hot glue to the top edge of tube over the beads and place the other disk in place.
Fold a piece of tin foil into a triangle. Push your triangle into the open end of the tube. Trim the end as needed. Make sure to reform the shape. It will work best if the triangle has crisp, hard edges.
Cut out another disk using cardboard or thick scrapbook paper. Poke a hole through the middle of it & glue it to the tin foil end.
I wrapped my kaleidoscope in craft paper, but you can decorate however you like, paint, crayon, beads, ribbon.
Not quite like the real thing, but it still is fun to play with.
Butterfly Craft
What you will need:
An empty paper towel tube
Foam sheets
Scrap book paper
Pipe cleaners
Craft pom poms
Glue gun
Elmer’s Glue
Directions:
This was a pretty simple one. You could also do this on a smaller scale with a toilet paper roll.
Cut out foam pieces in the shape of the wings.
Using different colored scrap strips, wrap around the tube and glue using the hot glue gun.
Run the glue gun along the edge of the wing where they should meet with the paper towel tube.
Pour some glue into a paper bowl and let your munchkin dip the pom poms in and glue to the butterfly.
Mai decides it is way more fun to stuff the pom poms in the tube than to decorate with them.
Glue one large pom pom to the top for your head & use pipe cleaners to make antennas. Let dry and your craft is done.
