Ten Ways to Play: Cupcake Cases

You’d have to be Rupert Murdoch not to know that the Summer Holidays are upon us, meaning that the streets, shops, cafes, parks and restaurants are busier between the hours of 9 and 3 that they have been for the last few months. Neither PD nor I are huge fans of busy-ness, so the long vacation usually sees us spending more time at home than ever, crafting.

As usual, 10 Ways to Play is primarily about crafting with things that you have lying around in your kitchen cupboard. You don’t need a massive hoard of crafting stuff, although if you do, you can take these ideas and run with them. The point is that they are simple and quick, requiring few extras so are a great weapon to have in your arsenal on rainy days or when boredom hits.

1. Cupcake case creatures:  You simply cut out shapes from the cupcake cases, such as birds and turtles, attach them to straws and voila!
2. Rosettes: take several cupcake cases and stick together to create a flower. Glue a screwed up one to the centre of your flower. Cut two strips from a further case and stick to the rear of your rosette. Perfect for hair, horses and winner’s cups!
3. Butterfly mobile: this can be made with some of the creatures from idea 1. Using a paper plate as your mobile, hang threads to which you have attached/stuck/sewn butterflies and birds made from cupcake cases.
4. Flower picture: simple craft for little children. Stick cupcake cases onto paper, add a cotton wool ball as a centre (you could also use a balled-up cupcake case) and draw on a stem and leaf.
5. Sorting/Counting game:  Draw numbers or coloured circles in the bottom of each case and get your child to sort different objects into the cases, according to your instructions.
6. Lei: thread slightly scrunched cases, the more colourful, the better, onto string or wool to create a quick and easy fancy dress item.
7. Wreath: using the technique above, you can tie off a tight circle of cases to create a wreath. Add a rosette to finish with a flourish. Alternatively you could stick cases onto a circle of card cut from a cereal packet as in the flower picture (4).
8. Snowflake bunting: take the craft that’s been a round since the dawn of time and rework it on cute patterned cupcake cases. Just fold your case into eighths, snip out a pattern and unfold a masterpiece. String them together to create unusual bunting.
9. Car: Stick cupcake cases to toilet rolls and small boxes to create a mini-fleet of cars. Decorate as you wish!
10. Fishing game: snip a triangular section from each cupcake to create a fish ‘mouth’, then reattach the triangle as a tail at the opposite end. Repeat for as many fish as you wish to use. Draw on an eye. Attach a paperclip to the mouth of the fish, leaving the end extended so that you have a loop for the fish hook to latch onto. On the end of a length of string, tie another paperclip, this time levering out the outer end of the wire to create a hook. Tape the string to the end of a wooden spoon. Happy fishing.

Happily linked: Today’s Creative