Cardboard Tube Penguins

Trevor is always sad when the Christmas decorations come down (ok, me too.... ) so I wanted us to make some fun crafts that we could use to decorate the house for January. Perhaps it is the elementary school teacher in me, but the first thing that comes to mind when crafting with kids in January is penguins. Trevor was extremely enthusiastic about making some penguins.

We started by gathering empty toilet paper tubes, black and white paint, paintbrushes, craft foam in yellow and black, googly eyes, scissors and white glue. I hadn't originally planned on it, but we ended up using a glue gun to attach the wings.

First, we painted white ovals on the front of the toilet paper tubes. We let that dry (it only took about 5 minutes), then painted the rest of the tube black. We painted the top 2 inches of the inside of the tube black so that the bare cardboard wouldn't show (no need to paint lower than that- it won't show). Here are the finished tubes- mine is on the left and Trevor's is on the right.

Next, we used the foam to cut out two wings (black), a beak (yellow), and two feet. Here are mine:

Trevor opted for more chicken-like feet. His were much harder to cut out, but he did a great job. 

Once all the parts were cut out, we used white glue to attach the eyes, beaks, and feet. We let those dry. Then we used hot glue to attach the wings. Here are the finished penguins. Mine is on the left and Trevor's is on the right.

Adorable!