Don’t bother painting the foam ball, cover it with tissue paper instead! It’s such a quick and easy way to give something color with zero mess!

When you’re making your low-mess crafts, always keep an eye out for materials that can stick together without any glue. When you press the pipe cleaners into the foam ball, they stick there all by themselves. It’s amazing to see how quickly simple materials can be brought together to make a fun looking animal.

Paper Roll Lion

LEVEL OF DIFFICULTY 4/5

PARENTAL SUPERVISION NOT REQUIRED

Materials:

• 1 piece of construction paper (yellow)
• 1 toilet paper roll
• 1 foam ball (slightly larger than the opening in a toilet paper roll)
• 1 scrap of tissue paper (yellow)
• 5 pipe cleaners (yellow, brown and/or orange)
• 2 medium googly eyes
• 5 yellow pom poms (2 medium, 2 small and 1 very small)

Tools:

• Scissors
• Tape
• Glue stick
• Washable marker (black)
• Crafter’s tape

STEP 1: Cut out a rectangle of construction paper just large enough to cover an entire toilet paper roll. Use tape to hold one end of the construction paper to the paper roll. Then apply glue to the entire inside surface of the construction paper with a glue stick.

Roll it around the toilet paper roll, pressing it to the paper roll as you go.

STEP 2: Cut out a square of tissue paper, about 10 x 10 inches (25.5 x 25.5 cm). Place the foam ball in the middle, then wrap the tissue paper tightly around the ball. Twist the ends of the tissue paper tightly.

Cut off the twisted end of the tissue paper, about 1/4 inch (0.6 cm) from the ball and add some tape over the twist to hold it in place.

STEP 3: Cut each of the 5 pipe cleaners into 3 equal pieces. (You’ll end up with 15 pieces total.)

Take 2 of the pipe cleaner pieces (try to choose longer ones) and cut off a 1/2-inch (1.3-cm) piece from each one. Set these 2 small pieces aside. We’ll use them for the ears later.

STEP 4: Fold each of the pipe cleaner pieces in half, then poke them into the foam ball in a circle around the middle. Continue poking pieces into the foam until you’ve gone around the entire ball. Open each of the folded pipe cleaners into a rounded diamond shape.

STEP 5: Draw the face onto the lion using a black washable marker. Start by drawing a heart in the middle for the nose. Then draw a forward and backwards “J” shape down from the nose for the mouth. Finally, add 3 dots on both sides of the nose for the whiskers.

STEP 6: Apply crafter’s tape to the back of the googly eyes and press them in position on the face.

Bend the 2 small pipe cleaner pieces that you saved in Step 3 into 2 small “U” shapes and press them into the top of the head for the ears.

STEP 7: Cut out a “U” shape from the top of the toilet paper roll, just big enough to hold the lion’s head.

Place the lion’s head into the opening and use tape to attach it to the inside of the paper roll to hold it in place.

STEP 8: Cut a short tail for the lion, about 2 inches (5 cm) long by 1/4 inch (0.6 cm) wide. Attach the smallest pom pom to one end using crafter’s tape. Tape the other end to the bottom middle at the back of the paper roll at a bit of an angle so you can see the tail from the front.

STEP 9: Use crafter’s tape to attach the 2 medium pom poms as the lion’s feet and the 2 small pom poms as the lion’s arms.

Your paper roll lion is complete!