Last week I sat down with my grandson to work on a new craft project. He’s 4 1/2 year’s old and loves to craft! What’s really nice about this kid’s craft project is that it’s made entirely from scrap items that I had leftover from other projects. A great way to use up some of those supplies! Plus, you’re upcycling empty cardboard toilet paper rolls!
July 4th Firecracker Toilet Paper Tube Rockets
Empty Cardboard Toilet Paper Rolls
Scraps of Patterned Paper in Patriotic Colors and Designs
Two-Sided Tape
All-Purpose Craft Glue
Scissors
Metallic Pipe Cleaners, Metallic Garland Wire, Ribbons, etc.
Star Stickers
Note: To make the streamers you can use whatever you have on hand. Pipe cleaners, ribbons, yarn, garland wire, etc. We selected scraps of patterned paper in your traditional patriotic colors. You can certainly use construction paper too.
Use the toilet paper tube to get the measurements that you need for the piece of paper that you’ll wrap around the tube. We cut out our rectangular shape 1/4″ longer than needed so that we could overlap the ends. Use two-sided tape to secure it around the toilet paper tube.
You need a 3 1/2″ diameter circle to make the cone-shaped top. We found a cup and traced around the cup to get our circle. Use scissors to make a slit in your circle (halfway). Form circle into a pointed cone shape and secure it shut with all-purpose craft glue. The tape didn’t work too well and they kept popping open so we switched to the glue which worked well. Let dry for 1 hour. You’ll then glue it to the top of your rocket as shown in the photograph.
Trace around the bottom edge of your rocket on the opposite side of paper to get another circle shape. This one will be smaller than your first one. Use the tip of your scissors to poke a hole into the center of the circle. Use glue to adhere it to the bottom of your rocket. Let dry for 1 hour.
You can make the streamer tails with a wide variety of different materials (see note above). Cut 3 of them to your desired length. We twisted the one end together to bind them and then used glue to push them through the opening of that bottom circle. Lay rockets on their side to completely dry. You can add stickers to decorate them if desired. That’s it, you’re done!
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For next year this will be a project my grandsons would love to complete. I save toilet paper tubes for many different projects.
When my 5 year old grandson comes to my house, almost the first thing he says is lets do a craft so I am always on the lookout for these simple and fun projects.
That’s a fun 4th of July craft. I like that you just used what you had on hand.