Make Your Own MONSTER PUPPETS Printable Pattern

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So a couple of months ago, I was sitting behind this little boy at church and he pulled out these cute little hand puppets with interchangeable parts (like a Potato Head) and they kept him entertained QUIETLY all through church! At the end of the church service, I pulled out a scratch piece of paper and frantically started drawing all the little parts that I could remember. I then came home and drew up some puppets of my own. My sisters came over the next day and we spent the afternoon making these puppets with all their many different parts and the rest is history . . . I LOVE how they turned out and my kids (and husband!) have had tons of fun with them. We take them to church, to the doctor’s office, in the car- anywhere I need the kids to hold still and sit quietly for a little while. The best thing is all the parts can easily be stored in a Ziploc bag and thrown in your purse. Want to make some? Well, you are in luck because we are sharing all our secrets (and our patterns!)!

Seriously, aren’t they so cute?

So first you will want to cut out all your monster body shapes (the pattern is at the end of the post). You will want to cut out two body shapes for each monster and sew/glue the two shapes together so that you can stick your hand in them (like a puppet . . . obviously). We used flannel material and sewed the bodies of our monsters, but if I were to make these again, I would used felt and maybe even hot glue the edges (either way will work great). You can use any colors you want and make as many as you want (I have 2 kids and made four puppets so that they could each have two puppets). The velcro that I bought was sticky on the back, but even we ended up hot gluing the velcro onto the puppet to enforce it even more. I have been using mine for almost a year and have not had any problems with the velcro coming off.

We made about 6 shapes for each category. All of the parts were made with felt. We just kind of made them up as we went along . . . you will probably think of more fun things to make as you make your own!

Since making these, I think that it would be fun to add lots of different animal noses (besides just the pig nose!).

Onto the printable templates . . . for now, I just uploaded them as a JPG file . . . I am not sure how else to do it (besides uploading them to Scribd, but then some people would have to pay for the files and I want them to be free for everyone). So, the best thing would be to copy each image, then paste into a blank Word document. Resize the image so that it fills the entire 8 1/2 x 11″ page (it may be a little fuzzy, but you just need it so that you can cut it out and trace the pattern, so fuzzy is okay!) and print it out. From there, cut out all the shapes and trace them onto your felt. Cut out the shapes, glue them together as needed (such as the eyes and mouths), attach velcro to the back of all the shapes, and you are good to go! I think that covers everything, but if you have ANY questions, feel free to ask!

As you make your own and come up with fun new accessories, we would love to see them!! Please send us pictures and we will add them to our post so that others can see your great ideas! The possibilities with these puppets are endless!

Please, please, please only use these for your personal use. Don’t try and sell them or do something dishonest like that- it’s not nice. 🙂 But we know that you are all nice people.

Looking for other DIY projects?

Check out this Cinderella Dresser-Top Castle from Spoonful

and our Project Index!

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Questions & Reviews

Kylee says:

So cute! Definitely doing these! :)
Janelle says:

What an awesome idea!! I'm going to make some of these right away. Brilliant! Thank you so much for sharing!

-Janelle
homemadethisandthat.blogspot.com
Pam says:

I just LOVE these!!! They will keep the littlies entertained for ages. Thanks SO much for sharing.
Danielle says:

These are so fun! I love them. What a fun thing to do for your littles:>
Lindsey@ The Savvy Speechie says:

Oh my goodness! So wonderful! I work with Special Ed. kiddos, and this would be PERFECT. Really great! Thanks for sharing!
Babblin' Brooke says:

How fun! My girls are going to LOVE helping me make these for my boys. Maybe I'll be able to sit through a Sacrament Meeting. Cross your fingers for me ;)
Aleisha McD says:

HOORAY! HOORAY!! HOORAY!!!!!! I CAN'T wait to make these! Thanks for posting this, Sugar Booger! I love you!
Amanda B. says:

Camille- you are amazing! LOVE this idea. I am not crafty AT ALL, but I think I could handle this. :)
Just Jaime says:

Cute idea!
Deebi27 says:

Gosh, these are sooo darn cute. I want to make a set for my classroom friends to use and them do their own puppet shows. Will be really cute!
Thannk you for your creativity & generosity!
Becky says:

What a great tutorial. Thank you for sharing it...and the pattern makes it so much easier. We plan to make this this weekend.
Jessica says:

Thanks for the patterns and the great tutorial. What a cute idea.
Lindsay says:

Aw, these are so cute! What a clever idea. My kids would love these for sure! Thanks for linking this up @ Show & Share! You gals are so great to support my little blog!
Karen @ It's the Suburbs or Bust- Yo! says:

I definitely pinned this post- soooo cute!
Rachel says:

I just found your site while looking for a fun monster project for my 2 year old and 1 year old. Love it! I'm actually the youngest of 6 girls, no boys! It's so fun to see another family like mine.
CrazyHomemadeMom says:

Can I make these to give my nieces and nephews for Christmas as a quiet church activity. I love them.
Camille says:

@ CrazyHomemadeMom- of course! Thank you so much for asking! We don't mine if you make them as gifts . . . in fact, we think that they would be an awesome gift! Have a great holiday season!
Lindsey says:

Just wondering, did you use iron on interfacing at all to reinforce the parts or did you feel like they held up well enough without?
Julie says:

May I have your permission to share your design on a public library wiki about storytimes? I used commercially produced puppets like these today during a program, but I would like to promote your do-it-yourself design also. It would just be link-back to your site.
Julie says:

This comment has been removed by the author.
Camille says:

For sure! Thank you so much for asking! :)
ChristyKink says:

Love this! I am teaching an after school puppet class at my elementary school- we are so making these!!!
ChristyKink says:

Love this! I am teaching an after school puppet class at my elementary school- we are so making these!!!
My Totally Simple Life says:

My daughter want s Monster Party for her 3rd birthday, this would be a great project for the kids to do at the party and take home!!

so Cute!!
Melting Moments Blog says:

I just love this!! Thank you for the templates and inspiration!
Jenni Wall says:

Santa's little elves just finished making these for my daughters for Christmas. I am thrilled with how they turned out! Thank you so much for the post. I'm hoping these will be a great distraction on our Christmas travels. How do you store yours? Zip top bags? Do you put them all in the same bag? or do you have a separate bag for hands/eyes/etc?
Six Sisters says:

I have all of mine stored in a basket together, but you could do it however you want! So glad they turned out for you! Thanks for stopping by! -The Six Sisters
Cheryl Kirkness says:

These are so adorable! We're traveling this weekend and I hope I can find time to make these before I go. It would be great entertainment for my little guy. Thanks for sharing!
Roxanna says:

Just found your site and I love it! Love these monsters. I'm sure my almost 4 y/o will LOVE these. Thanks for sharing!
Krista says:

Love the idea. I altered it to make it even quieter and used magnets instead of Velcro... Worked great!
michelle says:

These are too cute! I can't even wait to p;ay with them let alone my son!!
Rebecca says:

Wonderful idea! I have a set my Mom gave us and they are great. However I needed more 'cute' pieces. Mine are all monster. I love some of your patterns. My set has the loop side of velcro on the eyes/nose/mouth/ect parts only. The puppet itself is made of a material that the velcro will stick to. I would love to find more of that fabric, I think it is a Dacron / Polyester with a fuzzy side.
kathy says:

Warm greetings to you all This is an answer to a prayer It is with a thankful heart filled with much Gratitude that I send this reply My linguistic skills and vocabulary appear very stunted when trying to describe my appreciation for your Generosity to put it bluntly is I am a BBC Born before computers chronologically advantaged and digitally illiterate What I am trying to do is make a hand puppet in the shape of a dalek to explain to children about the concept of fear. Sent enveloped in great expectations Kathy S
Kelly G says:

Thanks so much for posting these. I am just about to print off and use in my Monster Joey Scout Night coming up. We won't be making puppets - but will be building a paper monster using your patterns.
CD says:

Thank you! Using these as projects in middle school clothing and textile class!
Nicole Sweeney says:

Where can I find the printable template
Momma Cyd says:

This is one of our very first posts back in 2011. We don't have the template. When you click on the puppet pattern it will enlarge and you can see how basic it is to draw. Then make the size you need whether it is for an adult hand or a child hand size.