Craft Ideas For Kids - Super Easy Rainbow Wool Butterflies

Inspired by the abundance of butterflies in our garden, my daughter and I decided to make our own flying rainbow butterfly. I wanted her to make this craft project on her own with as little help from me as possible.
We had some gorgeous plant-dyed, felting wool left over from a previous project. My daughter chose the colours, I pulled out the first strands and she did the rest.
It was such a fun, quick, easy to do project - great after school or summer project when time is short.
We chose to make a big butterfly but you can make them smaller by using shorter strands of wool.
We tied our butterfly to a stick to make it fly. It's been lovely to watch her playing with her very own rainbow butterfly.

You will need : felting wool, or wool roving, string and a stick

1 - Select the colours you would like to use and lay them next to each other, lay some bright colourful stands on top. For a big butterfly, the strands we used were approximately 20cm.

2 -  Set aside your colourful stands. Create your butterfly's body; using dark wool, twist and roll between your fingers. If you want a hard body, you can needle felt or use wet felt techniques. I wanted this project to be as simple as possible for my 3 year old to make so we just used our hands to twist the body into shape.

4 - Once your butterfly body has been made, lay it aside. Start to fold your colourful wool strands so that the two ends meet in the middle underneath. This will create your wings.

5 - Tie your twisted dark wool along the middle, tie into a knot at the top and cut. Make sure you leave the ends long enough to create the butterfly's antenna.

6 - Tie a piece of sting on to a stick and on to the middle of your butterfly and watch it fly.