Paper Plate Painting Pufferfish Craft

Who doesn’t love the adorable pufferfish? With their inflated round shape and clumsy swimming stride, they’re like the underwater goofballs. And they’re the super cute ocean craft subject in our Paper Plate Painting Pufferfish Craft!

We made this Cupcake Liner Pufferfish Craft last year and it’s still one of our summer favorites. So colorful and fun! We hope you’ll love this Paper Plate Painting Pufferfish Craft just as much. We think you will, though, because not only is the subject the adorable pufferfish, but we achieved the spiky pufferfish effect with a cardboard roll stamping technique.

Simply cut thin snips on one end of a cardboard roll, fan out, then use as a stamp to splash in paint and make the spikes of your Paper Plate Painting Pufferfish Craft. Along with the cardboard roll and colors of acrylic paint, you’ll need white, black and colored paper to go with the colors paint. The rest of the supplies include paper plates, a white paint marker, glue stick, a 1” circle punch, and scissors.

Paper Plate Painting Pufferfish Craft

Supplies needed:

• White paper plates
• Cardboard roll
• Acrylic paint – various bright colors
• Paper – white, black, and colored paper in corresponding fish colors
• White paint pen
• 1” circle punch
• Glue stick
• Scissors

First, make your cardboard roll stamp.

Cut thin strips about ⅓ of the way up a cardboard roll. Continue around the entire roll.

Fan out.

Apply about 5 or 6 drops of paint in the center of a paper plate. Use the paper plate to spread about and stamp spikes around the outside edge of the plate. Let dry.

Cut out large circles of white paper for the pufferfish eyes. Punch circles with the 1” circle punch from the black paper for inside the eyes. Also cut out fin shapes from the corresponding color paper. Cut another circle of white paper. Fold in half and cut out the inside, leaving a ring of white paper.

Glue the black circles inside the larger white circles then glue to the pufferfish. Also glue ring of white paper in place for a mouth.

Apply 3 lines of white detail on the fins with a white paint marker.

Glue in place along the sides of the pufferfish.

Looking for more great ocean crafts for kids? Be sure to check out all of our fun summer craft ideas at Our Kid Things, with plenty of fish, turtles, octopuses, mermaids, crabs, and more!