Mister Maker glittery splat bugs

We love Mister Maker in our house. From time to time we attempt one of his crafty creations..... his glittery splat bugs were a real hit with Cakey and her friend, Miss Z.

If you decide to try making these splat bugs please listen to this word of warning: do this activity outside, glitter goes everywhere.

Step 1 – Place a generous dollop of pva glue in the middle of a piece of baking paper. I used a ceramic plate underneath the baking paper. Mister Maker suggested an old baking tray but I find that the pva glue rusts the tray.

Step 2 – With a paintbrush, spread out your pva glue to make the arms and legs of your splat bug. Try and make the glue as even as possible – not too thick (because it will take forever to dry) and not too thin (as it will flake when you try to peel it off the baking paper). As a guide, aim for a thickness of approx 1mm. An even glue surface is generally impossible when the spreading is being done by a preschooler so you may want to consider making the splat bug on some thick paper or card and not bothering with peeling it off later.

step 2 – spread out the pva glue to make the arms and legs of your bug

Step 3 – Sprinkle glitter onto the glue. You can also add sequins, googly eyes and paper noses or tongues (or whatever you like) onto your splat bug to give him some personality.

step 3 – sprinkle glitter on and add decorations

Step 4 – Shake off the excess glitter, you can reuse this glitter on more splat bugs. Both Cakey and Miss Z liked pouring way too much glitter onto the glue, we had to help them gently shake the excess glitter off onto their plates. I then transferred this excess glitter into bowls for them to reuse on more splat bugs.

step 4 – gently shake off excess glitter and reuse for more splat bugs

Step 5 – Allow to dry overnight. Drying time will actually depend on how thick your glue is. Our very first splat bug took a few days to dry as we had the glue way too thick.

Step 6 – Once dry, peel the splat bug off the baking paper and stick it where you want it. You may want to skip this part and just leave the splat bugs on whatever surface you originally made them. Out of the six splat bugs Cakey made only two were able to be successfully peeled off. The others had middles of really thick glue and legs so thin that they started to fall apart when I tried to peel them off... so instead, I roughly cut around them and stuck them on the wall with sticky tape.

step 6 – stick your splat bugs on the window or where ever you want them

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