Walking Sticks

Today's summer creature is the walking stick. For this craft you will need brown pipe cleaners, wiggle eyes, glue or glue dots, and a stick. A real stick. From outside. Break off any "branches" so it's just a straight stick.

The kids will take the pipe cleaners (cut to whatever size you want, depending on the size of your stick) and wrap them around the stick in 3 different spots: at the front, at the back, and in the middle. Wrapping them around just once is all it takes. The kids can form little feet if they desire. Then they glue two eyes on one end of the stick. That's why I like glue dots for this. They work like a charm.

That's all there is to it! If you have some thin wire, you could wrap those around the head for antennae, but I didn't have any on hand.

Fun Fact: Walking sticks can detach their legs if trapped or injured. A young walking stick will grow a new leg the next time it molts. Even some adults, which normally are done molting, will force themselves to molt again just to replace a lost leg.