Pop-up Day of The Dead Card with Printable

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Celebrating the Day od the Dead? Make a wonderful Pop Up Day of the Dead Card – a simple STEAM project for kids of all ages. Learn how to make this simple pop up mechanism and have some zen mindfulness time coloring in the different Sugar Skull Designs.

Sugar Skull pop ups with printable
Try to make your own Pop-up Day of The Dead Card

This of course also would be suitable for Halloween – if you are looking to make a creative Halloween card or craft then a good theme for that is Day of The Dead – as of course skeletons always make good Halloween DIYs. The templates include a blank skeleton skull card, which would be particularly handy if switching this activity out as a paper Halloween craft.

Back to Dia de Los Muertos celebrations (1st and 2nd of November)- if your kids enjoy making crafts then this pop-up Day of The Dead Card will keep them entertained and also provides some mindfulness time and time to think about loved ones! These pop up cards can then be places on an Dia de Los Muertos altar to honor the dead and be used as part of your general decor when exploring this mexican holiday.

The kids would have so much fun colouring in the sugar skulls and creating their own beautiful color designs.

We offer 4 sugar skull designs that include Day of The Dead flowers that you can use as a basis to the card – PLUS a design your own “blank” skull pop up template (particularly suitable as a Halloween Skull Pop Up Card). One of these designs is free for you to print and use! The others are available on my Teacher’s Pay Teacher’s Store, and also include a handy one page worksheet! Purchasing this, goes towards the upkeep and running of this website. Enableing me to provide you with free resources for as long as possible!

(NB: The video on auto play is our Sugar Skull Corner Bookmark)

Supplies needed to make the pop-up Sugar Skulls Card:

You are able to choose one of the 4 templates we offer
  • Template of sugar skull and flowers
  • Piece of card in your choice of colour
  • A pair of scissors
  • Glue stick (glue sticks are better than white glue when working with paper_
  • Colouring pens, markers and pencils – work with what you have to hand (oranges and yellows of marigolds are particularly popular colors to use for Sugar Skull activities)

As mentioned – one of the printables if available for free for you to download today. The rest are available in my teacher’s pay teacher’s store (including a one page worksheet printable – super handy for the classroom environment/ for craft sessions in the library). By making this small purchases, you are able to help suppor this website and enable me to continue to provide free resources for you!

Time for our simple pop up card making tutorial!

How to make a pop-up Day of The Dead Card

Draw your own or use the template we have created to use as the basis of the sugar skull and the flowers. You can use our template to trace a “blank” sugar skulls and use that to design your own too!

Begin by picking one of the templates you wish to use. Then start to colour in the sugar skulls and flowers with the colouring pens or pencils.

Spend time thinking about loved ones, when coloring in your Sugar Skull

As the Day of the Dead is all about remembering loved ones that have passed away, I encourage both you and your students to think about people that you care about and who have died.

Maybe choose their favourite colors when coloring parts of your sugar skulls? Talk about what they used to enjoy doing and what memories you have of them. A wonderful time to have some mindfulness but also remember the people who have passed away.

mindfulness coloring of sugar skulls

Once you have finished colouring it is time to cut everthing out.

Keep the white tabs when cutting out your sugar skull

Make sure not to cut out the strips on either side of the sugar skull as this will be needed to make the skull pop out of the card.

Make sure you fold both flaps over.

Fold over both the strips on the side of the sugar skull.

After, fold the sugar skull in half, so that the sugar skull design is on the outside and the blank side of the skull is on the inside.

Make sure the skull folds out instead of in.

Position your sugar skull in the centre of the card. Make sure the skull central fold, is aligned with the central line of your card.

Make a “note” of where the tabs are.

Then glue on strip on the sugar skull and stick it to the card. As mentioned, make sure that the crease in the sugar skull aligns where the card folds in the middle.

Next glue the other strip and stick that to the card as well.

Place the Day of The Dead flowers wherever you desire to put them as I have place some around the sugar skull and other on the front of the card.

Place you flowers where you want.

Finished! Now you should have a Day of the Dead pop-up card that has the sugar skull coming out of it with flowers surrounding it. This is such as easy DIY for the season.

Now it is time to write a little message or greeting for the special person you wish to give this too. Writing presonalised messages makes the card more meaningful and makes it look even better.

Day of the Dead Activities and Ideas

More Day of the Dead Ideas and DIYs for kids of all ages here! We love exploring Day of the Dead Crafts. I am sure you will find some great additional ideas for any Day of the Dead party or celebration.

Day od the dead for kids
Able to make more than one card with the sugar skull templates we offer.

If you loved this craft and want to learn more about the Day of the Dead, check out this fantastic article here.