Craft Time

Project Instructions: Cardboard Space Rocket

From this month’s OC Family Craft Time page— written instructions, photos and places to shop for supplies!

To Infinity & beyond: Cardboard Space Rocket
These easy rockets use discarded paper towel tubes. Using some paint, craft foam and your imagination, you and your child can create a fun space adventure! This project a little bit of adult help with wielding the hot glue gun.

Supplies you will need:
• Low-temp glue gun— these still get very hot and should only be handled by adults. I got mine at Michael’s for under $3.
• Craft Foam. You can get this handy item from almost any craft store but I found a nice packet from createforless.com (their site can be a tad overwhelming but there are good deals to be had).
• Acrylic paint— I chose white as my rocket base color but you can choose any color you like! Silver would be pretty fancy.
• Paper towel tube(s). Toilet paper tubes and mailing tubes are also good for this project but may require some tweaking on the template-sizing.
• Pencil
• Paintbrush
• Scissors
• CraftTime Cardboard Space Rocket Template

Prepare and trace
To begin, prepare your paper towel tube by giving it a few thin coats of acrylic paint. Print out the rocket template and trace the shapes on craft foam in the colors of your choice.

Cut
Cut out all of the traced shapes. Feel free to experiment with different shapes for a variety of rockets. You can test new shapes in paper before cutting your craft foam.

Rocket top
This step should be completed by an adult.
Bend the rocket top half-circle into a cone shape with a little bit of overlap. Using a low-temperture glue gun, apply a line of glue where the foam will overlap. Press and hold to set.

 
Final assembly
This step should be completed by an adult.
Apply glue to the base of the cardboard tube and attach the booster base (yellow). Apply glue to the vertical edge of each rocket foot (black) and attach to the base. Apply glue around the top of the cardboard tube and affix the rocket top (red).

Bonus level: Add windows, flags and ship names to personalize your rocket even more!

& ta da! A cute little rocket for your child to zoom around with or hang from the ceiling. Maybe add in a few glow-in-the-dark stars and make a whole universe!

Check back next week for the video tutorial!

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