Making little crafts from colour­ful papers is always fun. But it gets more exciting if the craft is in itself a surprise, as is the one we are making today — a paper fan that pops up from the paper roll, just like magic!

Let’s begin:

Things you need:

1. Colourful papers (five to six, you can use patterned if you want)

2. 8-inches long piece of thread or string (cut in two parts)

3. Scissors

4. Double tape

Directions:

1. First, we will make something to decorate our fan. It could be a butterfly, a rainbow or a heart with wings, just like the one I cut in two different colours and also the wings, picture 2.

2. Paste the wings behind the hearts, and put it aside for now, picture 3.

3. To make the fan, cut four or five small pieces of colourful papers, 3-inches wide, 5-inches long, picture 4.

4. Fold the paper in accordion shape and paste one on to the other, pictures 5 and 6.

5. To make the stick for the fan, take another coloured paper, at least four inches wide and eight inches long. Hold the accordion shaped fan from one side tightly and fold its tiny part inside the paper, see pictures 7 and 8.

6. Paste the double tape on both sides of the fan, then, paste the string or the thread on it, as shown in pictures 9 and 10.

7. Use a small piece of paper (here I used the red) and roll it lightly around the fan stick. Remember it should not be tight as you have to slide it upwards, picture 11.

8. Slide the red part over the fan carefully, use the double tape on top and bottom of the red paper, this is to secure the thread on both sides, picture 12.

9. To cover the tapes and thread, we will repeat step 7 by cutting a small piece of paper and pasting it over the red one with threads, pictures 13 and 14.

10. Our magic fan is ready, paste the heart with wings on top of the blue paper, picture 15.

The magic is, as you slide the blue part down, the fan will pop out from the top and as you slide it up, it will vanish. Isn’t it magic?

Well, try it for yourself and enjoy!

The writer can be reached at ithecraftman@gmail.com

Published in Dawn, The Business and Finance Weekly, January 5th, 2022