Cardboard fairy wings, a great activity for kids

I was doubting whether to propose the kids to make some cardboard fairy wings.

I try to believe that stereotypes are not so much my thing, so when it gets to raising my kids I try to avoid a too “boy – girl” view on things. However this seems to be a fight I’m about to lose. I can stand on my head as much as I want: my son loves everything with wheels and my daughter loves pink, fairies, princesses and playing “house”. So when I asked Victoria to choose our next cardboard crafts activity, the choice for cardboard fairy wings was quickly made.

While I went to collect the cardboard, Victoria and Lukas were eager to start the play. They went ahead and started practicing some fairy-flying through the living room. I choose 2 big pieces of cardboard from some cardboard boxes. Despite the challenges posed by Elena(1,5) dancing on the cardboard, I managed after a while to cut the cardboard fairy wings out. I put paper tape on the places  where paint would not stick, and the kids got to choose the colors they wanted to use for their cardboard fairy wings.

And surprise surprise…they chose pink and violet. I also added some glitter to make the wings look even more fairy like.

After painting one side, we put the cardboard fairy wings on the heater for them to dry faster. Though for Victoria that wasn’t going fast enough so she also tried to blow them dry. But after a while she gave up and decided she’ll better wait for her cardboard fairy wings to dry by themselves.

When both sides of the wings were painted and dried, I made some wholes in the back and used some ribbon to connected the cardboard wings to my little fairies.

And gosh I had some happy fairies flying around the house!

Making cardboard fairy wings is very easy and the kids and me had lots of fun playing with them, just that you need to be patient for the paint to dry 🙂

What did we learn from making our cardboard fairy wings:

• Patience: we had to wait for each side of the wings to dry before we could go on with our play.
• Basic color mixing: red + white= pink and red + blue = violet
• Pretend play/ drama play:  my two little fairies flew through the house and spread happiness all around 🙂

If your child is into fairies, then this printable fairy will also be fun to make. Also have a look at these easy to make fairy crowns. They fit very well with our cardboard wings don’t you think?

Update: Check on the blog of fun at home with kids how Asia took this cardboard fairy wings idea and gave her own twist to it!

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