Make puppets in minutes that your kids will play with for weeks!
My family has been in a movie funk lately. The movies we’ve recently seen have left much to be desired. We saw Clowdy with a Chance of Meatballs, and I thought my brain might melt it was so painful. Sure there was eye candy, but why do animated films have to only appeal to 7-year-old humor?
Disney’s Frozen rescued us from the movie tundra we were stuck in. Eye candy? Check. Fabulous songs. Check! Great humor that made my boys as well as me and my hubby laugh? Check! A plot that kept all of us entertained and engaged? Check, check and check!!
We loved it so much, my boys wanted to play out the movie when we got home. So we created easy character puppets they will play with for weeks.
Muppets in Minutes: Supplies We Used:
- Printed coloring pages
- Cardboard box – such as a cereal box; not the heavy corrugated kind
- Crayons/Markets
- Glue Stick
- Scissors
- Popsicle/craft sticks
1. Choose the coloring pages you’ll be using. Rather than stocking on up coloring books, my family prints out coloring pages directly from the computer. It’s easy to search Google for character images. Just type in “Ninjago coloring page” or “Doc McStuffins coloring page” to find just the ones you want. In our case, we searched for characters from Frozen.
2. Have your children color in the characters they chose.
3. While they are coloring, cut up the cereal box into large rectangles.
4. When they are done coloring, roughly cut around the character and glue the paper onto the brown side of the cardboard.
5. Spend more time cutting out the character more precisely. It doesn’t have to be perfect. Just following the general outline.
6. Glue down any corners that may not be secured down.
7. Tape a popsicle stick to the back of the character. And voila, you have a puppet they can play act with or even put on a show with!
Here are my children’s masterpieces. They’ve been having a ball playing the characters from Frozen. Tomorrow, it will probably be Ninjago.
We kept the background of Elsa to add drama. It works wonderfully. So when your child is making her puppet, let them decide what they want to keep and what to cut away.
Sometimes kids want more of the picture on their puppet.
Sven’s antlers were more intricate. But rather than worrying about making it perfect, I kept the general outline of the antlers.
I found your blog through The Great Blog Train! Check out mine too if you would like to stop by. Have a great week!
http://megmeg77.wordpress.com/
What a GREAT idea! A good source for the puppets would be the activity pages that film studios create and issue when they release a new kids’ movie.
very cute! my kids would love this
These are so cute, thank you for sharing.
This is such a simply yet nice and interactive craft for kids. I’ll have to go pick up some popsicle sticks and try it with my kiddo!
Such a cute idea!
I thought we were the only ones who did this!?! My daughter has always come home to make paper dolls and puppets with scenes colored into the back of shoeboxes, you name. We end up with quite the set up 🙂 I’m glad this movie is proving to be worth seeing, we had heard some ugly reviews from “reviewers”, but the parents I’ve heard from say it is great and enjoyable fun with their kids…I think I know who’ll I’ll be listening to 😉
Oh no! Every time an empty box shows up in the house, it turns into some type of background! And the easiest background of all? Have you daughter put on the puppet show behind the couch. It lets them “hide” while putting on a show.
Very Cute Idea! I will pass this on!
Thanks for the Post, Idea’s and the Pictures!
This is so much fun! I love that they can use any character they want to make their puppet!