Glittery Fish Placemats

Make glittery fish placemats with your child as a great creative project! These make great gifts too.

You will need:

• This FREE Fish template
• A sheet of hardboard (40x30cm)
• White primer
• Crepe paper in two different shades of blue and orange
• Permanent marker
• Oil pastels or wax crayons
• Glitter in two different shades of blue and orange
• Modge podge

What to do:

Lightly sand your hardboard, especially around the edges, and paint with white primer.

Let the kids cut the crepe paper in small squares. Cut the oranges squares in smaller squares than the blue squares.

Once the primer is dry, trace the fish design onto the hardboard using carbon paper. Draw the outlines with the black marker pen.

Do the background first, start at the bottom, paint layer of podge and glue the dark blue squares. Paint a bit of podge over the squares where the paper overlaps. The less messy way to get the squares onto the board is to spread them out and simply pick them up with your paintbrush.

When you get close to the lines for the fish, work from the lines outwards.

Once you are done with the dark blue, do the light blue on the top half. You will notice, with crepe paper, the areas where the paper overlaps will be a darker shade compared to the areas where the paper does not overlap.

Next, do the light orange on the fish. You can cover the entire fish in light orange as we are going to use a darker orange on the stripes, then the darker orange on the stripes and leave to dry thoroughly.

Tidy up the edges, trim any pieces of paper sticking over the edge using a craft knife or sharp scissors.

Tear four long pieces of crepe paper for the borders. Paint the edges of the hardboard with podge and lay down the strips, halfway, lengthwise.  Paint a layer of podge on the back of the edges of the hardboard and fold the paper over the edges.

Once dry, give the kids the crayons or pastels and add a bit of detail and shading to the fish. Outline the fish again using the black marker pen.

Paint a layer of podge over the light blue area and let the kids sprinkle the glitter over the area. Do the dark blue area and use a darker shade of glitter.

Now onto the light orange on the fish, sprinkle light orange glitter over the area. Finish off with the dark orange glitter on the stripes.

Leave to dry properly, shake off the excess glitter and give a last coat of podge. Remember to also seal the back of the placemat with the podge.

A lovely creative project for kids to make during Summer, glittery fish placemats!