When I’m stuck in the house with my daughter, I like to find crafts to do. With Easter coming up, I wanted to create an Easter basket but didn’t have anything to make one with. But you don’t need anything special. Two paper plates will do!
These DIY paper plate baskets are fun the whole year round, too. Mine was a rabbit, but you can do any animal and make them as sparkly or basic as you want. Considering my daughter is 21 months, I decided to keep mine quite basic for now.
They’re really simple to make and take 10 minutes or so, which is perfect if you’re also looking for a quick craft. Younger children will be able to do the majority of it themselves, too. All they’ll need some help with is the cutting.
What You’ll Need:
- 2 paper plates (maybe more depending on the animal)
- Felt tip pen
- Scissors
- Sticky tape/Glue
- Anything extra for creating the animal
Method:
1. Take one plate and cut it in half but in a curve. Keep both halves.
2. I did this after making the paper plate basket, but it’s probably best to do it here. Draw the face of the animal that you want on your plate. Let your children use their imaginations and go wild with this.
3. Take the half of the cut plate with the outward curve. Cut another curve into it to create some ears, and then snip that part in half.
4. For the smaller piece of plate, cut the ends off. These will become the inside parts of the ears. Color them in black or pink. You could opt to use colored card or paper for this part if you really want.
5. Stick the colored parts of the ears in the middle of the larger white ears. Now stick them to the full plate at the top of the face.
6. Stick the half with the inward curve to the second paper plate. You want to stick them so the plate fronts are facing each other. That will create a small gap for the basket. When sticking, making sure there are no gaps along the whole sides of the two plates. You don’t want to lose the things you’re storing!
Optional: on the back of the basket, use some cotton wool to create a little tail for the rabbit. For other animals, you can use pieces of string, strips of paper and even bits of felt.
There you have it! It’s really simple to make and can be created in minutes. The part that will take the longest is the animal face. I really recommend getting as creative as possible with it. Share when you try it – what animal did you make?
This is so awesome – My kids will have so many ideas to make these things.