We ADORE Toilet Paper Crafts for Kids. This week’s book & craft has been “brewing” for a while… I am not sure why haven’t done it sooner, maybe I thought Red Ted was still too young. Well, he is in terms of crafting, but he isn’t in terms of painting, sticking, helping and of course PLAYING! So, we embraced the craft – a great one for children 5yrs+ or with a helping adult!!! Red Ted loves the resulting Toilet Paper Roll Giraffe marionettes!!! These Giraffe Puppets where inspired by the wonderful Picture Book Giraffe’s Can’t Dance. More on that below!
Without a further a do…
Note: This post was first published in May 2010 (wow!!) and has been updated and reshared with you!
Joining in with National Reading Month challenge!
The Picture Book – Giraffe’s Can’t Dance
Giraffe’s Can’t Dance, by Giles Andreae. Early this week, I already reviewed “Giraffe’s Can’t Dance”. Here we have it again: I have to confess to picking this book up, because I like the “format”. Our version is a smallish board book. I also liked the rhythm and rhyme of the book and Red Ted liked the bright colours. Here we have the story of a Gerald the giraffe that is, well, a little clumsy on his feet. Each year the jungle holds a jungle dance and Gerald feels left out has he is so “rubbish”. Sadly he wanders off… however, a small cricket helps him discover his “inner self”. A lesson: we are all good at something, as long as we find the right way for us. Hurray! Happy Ending.
Today we are going to make Gerald as a fun Toilet Paper Roll Giraffe Marionette! The materials are very simple!
You can get copies of the book here:
(affiliate links)
Toilet Paper Roll Giraffe Marionette
Toilet Roll Giraffe Materials
- 2 loo rolls per Toilet Paper Roll Giraffe,
- 1-2 sheets of A4 in contrasting colours (red & yellow in our case),
- paints (red & yellow, I prefer acrylics as they don’t get so dry and crumble like some poster paints),
- brushes,
- scissors,
- glue and later
- chopsticks and string (not shown in photo, as only decided to add these later)
How to make a puppet with Toilet Paper Rolls
2) Paint two loo rolls yellow. Red Ted decided he “wanted” red, so I decided to make 2 giraffes with him. So we painted another 2 loo rolls red. I helped him, as he was getting a little tired!
3) We then dabbed on some spots in the contrasting colour with cotton wool. I think lots of paint gives it nice “texture” to your toilet paper roll Giraffe!
4) Let it dry.
The Toilet Paper Roll Giraffe Puppet’s Legs
Start on the legs.
5) I didn’t have yellow paper, so I quickly “made” some with cotton wool and watered down paint… Just means you have to wait for it to dry. I only did one side. Don’t think it matters if one side is white and the other yellow. If your children have a longer attention span, they can help with this too!
6) Cut the paper in to even strips. I made mine about 1cm wide and used a ruler to help me (marked one sheet, but cut four sheets in one go). The neater and more even you cut, the better!
7) The “tricky bit”: Take one yellow and one red strip. It is kind of like pleating the two pieces of paper. Glue down the first two bits and then alternately fold over. Once you get to the end of the paper, I glued on another strip. So each leg and neck is made of 2 yellow strips and 2 red strips of paper. Glue top down.
8) Make 5 for each giraffe (so we made 10 – got a little boring, I admit). Whilst I folded. Red Ted did some play gluing and play folding with extra strips of paper! I also made 2 smaller sets (about 1/2cm wide) in one colour for the horns and cut out some “ears”.
Assembling the Toilet Paper Roll Giraffe Marionette
9) Cut down one loo roll for head (about 2/3rds)
10) Glue legs and neck on. I used cloth pegs to keep them in place whilst drying.
11) Glue on horns, ears and draw eyes/ stick on googly eyes
I found at this point that the giraffes were finished, but no so easy to play with, as the neck kept flopping about. So I decided to make marionettes out of them – I used some take away chopsticks (but lollipop sticks will do) and garden string!
12) FINISHED!
We then revisited the story at bedtime. Red Ted was delighted! And the Gerald and Geraldine have indeed been doing LOTS of dancing!
You can watch us play with them over on YouTube (warning: very ancient not very good video!! hahaha).
What have you made using Toilet Paper Rolls? Let me know in the comments below!
Fancy more easy TP Roll Crafts for Kids? Check these out!!
What others are reading
story + art = Great Start – The Jolly Postman & Simple Postcards
Kids Get Crafty – Dog Loo Roll Marionette (Victor van Krumm)
Kids Crafts: Stick Man
Red Ted gets stuck in!
Get Crafty – June 2010 – Inspired by Nature
Hooray for Fish – Footprint Fish for Kids
Craft Carnival – all things crafty!
How to… make Felt "Strawberries & Cream" & Gingerbread Men!
This is a really cool idea. I love it
Thank you 😉 we certainly had fun with them…. wonder how long they will “Live” – but then we can make somem more..
Looking forward to when my little one is old enough to do things like this – looks fun!
😉 I will be making them again when Red Ted is 5+. but dont underestimate th 2yrs olds now.. he LOVED the painting and watching me fold, whilst he glued… he feels really proud of “his” giraffes!!! Go on.. do it “earlier” than you think you can!!!!
Lové to Know what he glued. Bet hé had fun though, can you do goats next?
Send me a good book on goats (can be french too!!!) and we can give it a go 😉 xx
This is so cool!!! I can’t wait to see if my library has this book and make this project with Emily. I will totally be making my own too!!
Thank you for sharing and linking up to stART 🙂
This is adorable! I love it! Kudos to you for attempting a rather complicated activity with such a little one, too. 🙂
That book looks really cute, too. I haven’t run across it at any of our libraries.
Thanks for linking up to Read Aloud Thursday!
Those giraffes are awesome. We also enjoyed this book a lot.
We love that book. I love how you did the craft. They turned out so cute!
Ooooh, I love the giraffes that you made. What a perfect storytelling prop. I remember learning how to make those “pleats” in step #7 when I was a little girl. I used to use them to make my own pop-out cards.
These are the best. I loved seeing them in action.
Wow what a great idea….and it came out so nicely. Love it! Dropping by via stART!
LOVE this! Way too cute. It is nice when they’re a little older – you have a whole new world of crafting opened up to you. But you’re right – they joy of playing with the craft is fun at any age. 🙂
Love those folded legs. They look like a lot of fun to play with.
adorable! I’m going to tuck this away until my guy is a little older – but looks like tons of fun!
So cute! You’ve got mad craft skills!
Visiting from WFMW
🙂
Oh please, is so, so cute!! thanks a lot for joining to my blog party! (now the theme is “laundry”)
Hugs from Spain
meni ^-^
Awww! So cute and sounds like a great bookl I’ll have to check it out. Thanks for linking up!
Such a great art project, thanks for sharing!
Love the book and your fabulous giraffes…of course they can dance!
Genius- and so cute!
thank you! We had fun!
That is soooooo sweet! My son will love that! Thanks for linking up to gettin ‘crafty on hump day 🙂
OOh, would be fabulous if you made one with your son! Go on, you know you want to!! Thanks for hosting!
Wow, thats incredible! I love it, but might feel the same way about Laci being too young, plus her attention span is super short. I will have to keep this in mind. As always, thank you for linking (BTW- I took care of the links on Wednesday’s post for you). ~Julie
Oh I adore this project. It is going in my style file for sure!
Oooh, fabulous! Do hope you get to make some some day!!! Red Ted loves playing with his…
That is way, way beyond cute!!
Very cute! Thanks for linking up to Finished for Friday!
What a fun idea! Thanks for sharing @ Anything Related!
Once again. Such a cute idea!
Thanks for posting this! We did this craft and my kids just loved it. You can see pictures here:
http://scribbleprints.blogspot.com/2010/08/what-my-kids-have-been-up-to-this-week.html
U-oh, now I DO need to place an Amazon order. Have poked my nose over this book for ages but don’t have it yet. Worth buying it just so we can make these .. just SO fab!! L will laugh his socks off. Can’t wait to play!
MJM.
This is an AMAZING idea!!! I can’t wait to try this with my child!
I love these. I have a stash of loo rolls, so fully expect to be making giraffes in the new year 🙂
Oh Hooray!!! Have fun making and PLAYING with these!! 🙂
oh wow, they look GREAT 🙂
Thanks for joining in Blog Gems. Jen
Those are really cute!!
Aaaah thank you! We had real fun making (and playing) with these.. am surprised we still have them a year later more or less in one piece!
We love this book and we read it regularly. Will definitely have to make these! Thank you so much for sharing such a great craft project.
Aaaah thank you and pleased you like the book (I think it is lovely)… only think I would do differently on the giraffes is make the neck fatter and shorter… else we love them 😉
These are so cute! And I love that they’re made with tp tubes – my kids love to hoard the tubes for crafts. We’ll have to try this.
Thank you! I am going to try a new animal soon!
This is one of our favorite books. Defne will be delighted with these marionettes.
It really is a lovely book! 🙂
Cute! my daughter would love making those!
Do have a go! And would love to see any results!!!
Linking this up with us plus the organza flower made the Creative Bloggers’ Party & Hop better and more special. Thank you! And I hope you don’t mind if I ask you again to join us this Sunday 🙂
I will be there – have added you to my “linky calendar” 😉
these giraffes are wonderful! thanks so much for sharing on Craft Schooling Sunday, great to have you every week.
They are fabulous! The way you made the legs & neck is what we used to do with our chewing gum wrappers as teenagers. It would be a competition to see who could make the longest…you triggered a great memory for me x
Mama Syder – aaah how lovely! Pleased it brought back memories!! Funny what you get up to as kids!
wow! Your creations never fail to astound me…. FANTASTIC! Thanks for linking up!
Saw these year ago and still think they are awesome! 🙂
Yes, I am highlighting an “old” post every week!! Thank you!
yes if you like french cook le repas a domicile fan page
Wow! this is such a cool idea. 🙂
Thank you 🙂
Love love love this!
I have a 4 yr old son and 2 1/2 yr old daughter to try it with.
One thing has anyone tried putting beads in the feet for added weight and ‘clipclop’ sounds?
I will try and let everyone know. Xx
You have such the best ideas – and these look like they can be a lot of fun too.
Awwwhhh… I love this giraffe. What a great storytelling combination. Adorable!
Hugs Bea
Thank you!!