Tuesday, November 23, 2010

Best Ever Paper Snowflakes

...or at least these are the best that I have ever made by a long shot.  Today I took our fall leaves down and put up a bunch of these.  Before when I've made paper snowflakes they always turned our square and weird looking.  Now I've learned some tricks to making beautiful round ones. 
  1. Real snowflakes have symmetry 6 ways because of their crystal structure, so you want fold the paper six ways. 
  2. It also helps a lot if you use coffee filters.  
We don't drink coffee, but I picked up a pack of 100 coffee filters at the store yesterday for about 80 cents.  Coffee filters have a two main things going for them...they're thinner than regular paper, and they're already cut into perfect circles for you...guaranteed no more square shaped snowflakes.


All you need are some coffee filters (or other tissue paper), scissors, and an iron (although the iron is optional.  Here's how you do it.







Now you can go hang them in your window.  I just used scotch tape.  If you're having your first real snow of the year like we are, then they just might match the landscape.  (There's a lot more snow on the ground now, than when I took these this afternoon.)  If you're in one of the warmer parts of the country, these are still a fun activity to do with the kids to get in a wintery mood.

And lest you think these turned out well because I'm some genious of paper cutting...here are the ones my kids made. 
(Sorry about the flash photography, but I forgot to take a picture earlier.  And while the window has seen cleaner days...those are snowflakes you're seeing, not the kids' window smudges.)

Most of them were made by this little snow princess, age 5. 
The one on the top right was made by Little Brother, age 3.  I folded the filter paper for them and then let them do their own cutting.  They did much better with the cutting than I expected, but they did have a little trouble taping them up...and hence a few missing snowflake points.

If you're looking for other snowy activities, you can check out my previous post here about snowy make-believe activities.  (Wouldn't you know the day I posted about make-believe snow activities is the day we got a load of REAL snow to play in.)

I recommended this book yesterday, but I'll mention it again here since it goes so well with this activity.  My kids' love I am Snow by Jean Marzollo  It's an awesome book about snow for the kindergarten and preschool crowd.

14 comments:

  1. Man, using the coffee filters is genius. I just might have to do that. Thanks Polly!

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  2. Genius is exactly the word I was thinking of, too. Just added them to the shopping list. Thanks, Polly! Your decorations look great!

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  3. So smart! I have a pack of coffee filters lying around and some bored kids so guess what we are going to do right now??? Thanks so much!

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  4. gorgeous! using coffee filters is a great idea! my four year old LOVES using a scissors so we will do this for sure!

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  5. They are beautiful. I have a ton of coffee filters left from last Christmas when I used them to separate cookies in one big container.

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  6. Those are some great snowflakes! I admit, I LOVE to cut out snowflakes! I never thought of doing the coffee filter, it's a great idea! I'm very happy to be going home to some snow in less than a week :)

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  7. Super neat!! I will definitely be trying these!!! Thanks for sharing :-)
    http://thoughtsofesme.blogspot.com/

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  8. Just finished (before I found this) making snowflakes with my kids. We laminated them and using a hole punch put ribbon and combined with fake greens decorated our front railing.....Looks great and festive.

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  9. Oh bless you! No more square snowflakes ever!!
    :D
    *Now following and loving!!*

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  10. Thanks so much for your lovely tutorial! It came just at the right time for me!!!!
    I linked to this over at my blog
    http://muffinsnmore.blogspot.com/2010/12/snow-snow-snow-snowflakes.html
    You are of course welcome to check it out! :-)
    Have a nice Advent!

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  11. Hola, es la primera vez que visito tu blog, muy interesante la idea de los copos de nieve, gracias por compartir, te visito desde Guadalajara, Jalisco, México

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  12. darling idea polly! would you link it up to my christmas party?
    http://busyasabeeinparis.blogspot.com/2010/11/christmas-ideas-for-children-des-idees.html
    xo, maria

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  13. Just letting you know I linked to this post in my Snowflake Unit Study http://www.zujava.com/snowflake-study

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