Coffee Filter Butterflies Craft Project

Make colorful butterflies with coffee filters, pipe cleaners, and some washable markers to welcome Spring!

When there’s a snow day and it’s miserable outside, you gotta come up with something for the kids to do. This is when I dive into my craft bin and figure out something for them to make. While there may be snow and ice on the ground, we are ready for Spring. So we made these fun and easy Coffee Filter Butterflies.

They only take a few minutes to make but the kids enjoyed making all different designs. And it helped up think warm thoughts.

If you have a craft bin like I do, you probably have all the supplies you need and you could make a number of variations from this project.

Coffee Filter Butterflies

Supplies:

1 X ROCKLINE BASKET COFFEE FILTERS (8-12 Cup Basket) 700 FiltersCrayola Broad Point Washable Markers – Pack of 2 (58-7808-2Pack)Whitmor Heavy-Duty Natural Wood Clothespins, 100 pinsTolco Empty Spray Bottle, Frosted Assorted ColorsCreativity Street Chenille Stems/Pipe Cleaners 12 Inch x 6mm 100-Piece, Assorted ColorsWatch them wiggle eyes, Black(500 PIECES) – BULKCreativity Street Hot Colors Pom Pons, 0.5-Inch, 100-Pack (AC8114-02)

First, flatten out your coffee filters on a washable surface. Let your children color a bunch of color filters using washable markers. The more they color each coffee filter, the better!

Once you have colored the coffee filters, spread them out on some paper towels and let your child spray/mist the filters with water. Try not not have them get them completely soaking wet; the water will make the colors run together to get a tie-dye effect. I also stacked them on top of each other which let the colors bleed from one filter to the next!

Let the filters dry completely before moving on. Once dry, your butterflies are ready to be assembled. Take wooden clothes pins and put them through the middle of the coffee filter. I tried folding it like a fan and then putting it through, but honestly just scrunching it up worked and looked best! You could add a little glue if you want to make them more permanent.

Once you have all of the clipped, you can draw on eyes, glue on googly eyes, pom-poms or even use pipe cleaners for antennas.

What do you do with these now? Well you can hang them in the windows or even put a magnet on the back for the fridge. Or give them to the grandparents!

Let your child’s imagination go wild and make a number of different types of butterflies! Oh, and most importantly, have fun!

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Coffee Filter Butterflies Craft Project

Print

Make colorful butterflies with coffee filters, pipe cleaners, and some washable markers to welcome Spring!

Prep Time 5 minutes

Active Time 10 minutes

Total Time 15 minutes

Difficulty easy

Materials

• Coffee Filters
• Markers
• Clothespins
• Spray Bottle
• Pipe Cleaners
• Googly Eyes
• Pom Poms

Instructions

1. First, flatten out your coffee filters on a washable surface.
2. Let your children color a bunch of color filters using washable markers. The more they color each coffee filter, the better!
3. Once you have colored the coffee filters, spread them out on some paper towels and let your child spray/mist the filters with water. Try not not have them get them completely soaking wet; the water will make the colors run together to get a tie-dye effect. I also stacked them on top of each other which let the colors bleed from one filter to the next!
4. Let the filters dry completely before moving on. Once dry, your butterflies are ready to be assembled.
5. Take wooden clothes pins and put them through the middle of the coffee filter. I tried folding it like a fan and then putting it through, but honestly just scrunching it up worked and looked best! You could add a little glue if you want to make them more permanent.
6. Once you have all of the clipped, you can draw on eyes, glue on googly eyes, pom-poms or even use pipe cleaners for antennas.

Notes

What do you do with these now? Well you can hang them in the windows or even put a magnet on the back for the fridge. Or give them to the grandparents!