Celebrate the arrival of spring by using our butterfly template to make this beautiful butterfly craft.
This simple butterfly craft is easy for kids to make and will look gorgeous hung on display at home or school for the spring or summer season.
We created the butterfly body and wings in this kids craft in a way that they pop off the blue background, giving the colorful craft a fun 3D effect.
Children will love the ability to choose which colors they use with the butterfly template to create a unique and colorful butterfly craft.
Read our simple how-to instructions below for making a colorful butterfly craft below, and make sure to watch our full video tutorial inside this post before you get started.
You’ll find that our butterfly wings template is very versatile and you can use it to create a variety of different butterflies.
To simplify prep for this fun butterfly craft, we have created a printable template you can purchase in our shop.
Included with the template is printable how-to instructions and helpful tutorial photos. Click the blue button below to be taken to our shop to purchase the template.
The template is optional and if you prefer not to purchase it, you can easily follow along with our tutorial instructions below to see how to create your butterfly.
Supplies needed to make a colorful butterfly craft:
- Printable Butterfly Template <—– Get the template in our shop
- blue cardstock paper
- 24 lb. colored paper (colors of your choice) or construction paper
- pipe cleaner
- googly eyes
- markers
- tape
- scissors
- glue stick (we love extra strength glue sticks)
Instructions for making the beautiful butterfly craft
1. Print out butterfly template on colored paper and cut out pieces
Copy or print out the butterfly template on colored paper or construction paper. Several of the pages have more than one template on them to conserve paper so keep that in mind when printing them out.
You can also use the template as coloring pages for the kids to color and then assemble the butterfly craft. If you are having children color their template pieces with crayons, we’ve included an alternative wing spots page at the end of the template.
2. Form four body pieces into circles
Form the four body pieces into circles. To do this, add a line of glue at the end of each paper strip. Fold the strip into a circle, overlapping the two ends and gluing them together.
3. Glue butterfly wings in the center of cardstock paper
Add glue in the center of the butterfly wings and glue it down in the center of a blue piece of cardstock paper. Leave the outside of the wings unglued from the blue cardstock to help give extra dimension to your butterfly craft.
4. Make butterfly antennae
Cut a pipe cleaner in half to make your butterfly antennae. Fold the pipe cleaner section in half and then tape it down at the top of the butterfly wings.
Bend down and curl the ends of the butterfly antennae.
5. Glue body pieces down the center of butterfly wings
Add glue along the back seam of each of the body pieces and glue them down the center of the butterfly wings to create the butterfly body.
6. Glue wing spots
Glue each of the butterfly wing spots onto the butterfly wings.
7. Glue eyes, draw a smile
Glue googly eyes on the top body piece. Then use a marker to draw a smile on your butterfly.
8. Bend and curl the ends of wings(optional)
To add extra dimension to the craft, bend and curl the ends of the wings in so that they pop off the page slightly. Curling the ends around a pencil might be a helpful way for young children to complete this step.
Now that your beautiful butterfly craft is complete, hang it up on display for a colorful spring decoration at home or school.