both, the elder does the rest herself, including drawing the face, whereas our younger girl needs me to cut the pieces out. You can make any type of
animal – we have done butterflies, elephants and once a “flying giraffe”. Here I am explaining how to make a butterfly:
Step One – back the toilet roll. You can't draw on the toilet roll centre, it looks terrible, so it needs backing. Measure the height and circumference of the toilet roll and measure out a section of card (ideally use the corner) the same height but an inch longer.
Step Two – Let the little cherub colour in that section, which is the body of the butterfly.
Step Three - Cut this out, glue one side, stick it to the toilet roll centre and secure it with sellotape.
Step Four – draw the pieces of the butterfly – a head with antennae. Either draw the face yourself or let the little one do it. Then have them colour in the head, which must be
mike webb
done front and back. Also draw the wings, which need to be near enough symmetrical or it will fall over.
Step Five – Have the child colour in the wings, front and back.
Step Six – Cut out the wings and head, and attach to the body with glue and then secure with sellotape.
The whole process takes no more than half an hour or so; depending on how quick and efficient your children are at colouring, you can normally create a couple of animals per child in a sitting. The only real limitations are your imagination, the colour of available card and the number of toilet rolls the family gets through.