Design sparkly mermaid tails with cardstock, glitter glue, and watercolor paints. This easy kids craft is great for building fine motor skills and inspiring creativity in kids who love pretend play and mermaids.
What You’ll Need
- Cardstock
- Glitter Glue
- Paint Brushes
- Watercolor Paint
How to Make a Mermaid Tail
- Cut cardstock into the shape of a mermaid tail. I free-handed it because it was faster than printing out a template, and, let’s be honest, it is just a craft to occupy two kids under 5. We used white cardstock, but any color works well, so feel free to let kids experiment. Cardstock or thick paper works best because kids put on a lot of glue and paint, and you don’t want the paper to rip.
- Give the mermaid tails and glitter glue bottle to the kids. My oldest can squirt the glue directly on the tail and make her own designs. My youngest doesn’t have the grip strength yet, so I gave her a small bowl of glitter glue and a paint brush.
- Set aside mermaid tails to dry. Depending on how much glitter glue they added, it may take a while. We let ours dry overnight.
- Paint with watercolors. My kids really liked that they could add a few different colors to their mermaid tails and the colors all blended together pretty nicely.
One thing that I will add is that my kids wanted to keep playing with the glue and paint brushes after they had finished making their glittery pattern on the mermaid tails, but the tails weren’t dry yet. So, we added more cardstock, foam shapes, and goggly eyes to their play tray, and they had a lot of fun playing and making collages.
Because we went through half a bottle of glitter glue, I really thought this kids craft would be messier. As it turned out, everything washed up quickly and easily. Glitter glue is much easier to clean up than regular, loose glitter. My toddler got really “into” it. She had glitter all over her arms, but it all washed up with a little dish soap and water.
My girls absolutely love mermaids, so we do a lot of mermaid-themed activities. Print my free mermaid play dough mats and lacing cards here. If you are interested in more printable activities, check out my Etsy shop for printable mermaid busy book activities. Graphics by Prettygrafikdesign.
Kindred Inspiration 