How to Make a Sock Puppet that Eats

If you have kids and an old sock or two, pretty soon you could have a sock puppet and hours of sock puppet fun. This sock puppet is a twist on the popular favorite—a sock puppet that can "eat."

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Sock
• Fabric or cardboard scraps
• Pens or markers
• Glue
• Scissors
• Googly eyes (optional)
• Needle and thread (optional)

1. Choose a sock for your puppet. Any old sock will do, although of course it will need to fit comfortably over the puppeteer's hand. If you've got an assortment of unmatched socks, you are well on your way to a whole puppet village.

2. Put your hand into the sock and pinch your fingers and thumb together. These will be your puppet's lips. In this position, mark where the eyes, hair, tongue or any other decorative features will go. Also make a mark at the back of the puppet's "throat," where it will swallow things.

3. Take your hand out of the sock and use the fabric scraps to make features and glue them on at the marks. For a simpler puppet, just draw the features on with markers.

4. When any glue is dry, cut a small slit at the throat mark. Most socks should be sturdy enough to use the puppet for a while without any further modification, but if you want your puppet to be especially durable, hem the throat slit, or carefully coat the edges with glue.

5. Make pieces of "food" that will fit through the throat slit out of fabric, cardboard or other small objects.

6. Practice eating with your sock puppet. Once you get the hang of it, it's pretty easy to pick up the "food" with your fingers and get the puppet to swallow it.

[helps4hardtimes]

on 8/2/2009 Adorable idea and sounds like fun to make a sock puppet that eats!