Dragonfly Craft

A couple weeks ago, my son was dead set on making a dragonfly out of a paper towel tube.  I don't know how this idea captured him, but far be it for me to stop creative genius, right?  ;)  It was easy enough to paint a cardboard tube and add on some pom pom eyes, but the real beauty here was trying out this aluminum foil coloring technique I saw on Pinterest a while back.  You glue yarn to paper, and cover with aluminum foil.  Press all around and color in the recessed areas to get vibrant results!  Perfect for dragonfly wings.

Supplies

• Paper towel tube
• Paint
• 2 pom poms
• Sheet of paper
• Yarn, string, or pipe cleaners
• Glue
• Aluminum foil
• Markers (Sharpie would be best)
• Popsicle sticks
• X-Acto knife or similar

Directions

1. Paint paper towel tube and let dry.  While drying, make wings.
2. Cut out 4 wing shapes (2 larger and 2 smaller) from paper.  Glue on yarn in different patterns to create wing designs.  Dragonflies have very elaborate patterns on their wings but just making some interesting line patterns will suffice.
3. Lay aluminum foil on top of wing shapes and smooth out to see yarn designs come through.  Cut or fold aluminum foil to match wing shape.
4. Color in recessed areas between yarn lines.  For toddlers, let the colors go wild.  Older kids may enjoy trying elaborate patterns with the colors.
5. Cut 4 slits in sides of paper towel tube and slide popsicle sticks through.  Glue wings to popsicle sticks- bigger wings on top and smaller on bottom.
6. Fold in bottom of tube to mimic tapered tail, or crumple and shape newspaper to make tail, then paint.
7. Glue on pom pom eyes, and you're set to fly!