Coffee Filter Butterfly Craft

Butterflies and butterfly crafts have been the number one request from my 5.5 year-old lately. Some of the recent butterfly crafts we have done include this beautiful Monarch Butterfly, this Painted Lady butterfly, a cute Paper Roll Butterfly, a Handprint Butterfly, a GIANT Printable Butterfly, and a Popsicle Stick Butterfly. Okay, that’s more than a few, but they are all cute and really simple to do!

We recently did a coffee filter butterfly craft at our local library’s story time… Lorelai loved it, and requested we do another one. We used paint dabbers this time and it came out great! Directions are at the bottom of this post…. enjoy!

Materials are listed in the photograph above.

Directions:

Using the paint dabbers (or markers), have your child decorate a flattened coffee filter.
Once s/he is done, have then use a spray bottle to lightly mist the coffee filter. The paint/markers should start to blend together. *Note: don’t spray too much water or let your child play with the coffee filter, as they are very fragile when wet.
Set aside and allow your coffee filter to dry.
While that is drying, cut out the antennas from the construction paper and glue down. (Note: you can use pipe cleaners for this – just wrap them around the clothespin!)
Glue on the small googly eyes.
When the coffee filter is finished drying, pinch from top to bottom until the middle is completely scrunched up.
Clip your clothespin to the scrunched coffee filter.
Next, you’re going to adjust the wings. Use your fingers to smooth it out some so that the coffee filter resembles wings.
You’re done!

Other Things to Consider:

If you don’t have coffee filters, you can use large paper towels cut into circles (trace a bowl!).
You can tie fishing line to your butterfly and hang it from the ceiling – a great way to display them!

Books About Butterflies: