How to Make an Animal Pencil

Animal pencils are a great beginner craft for young children.

You can decorate ordinary pencils to look like nearly any type of animal. Sculpt clay and detail it to represent the animal's face. Use felt, string, googly eyes, cotton balls and other basic craft supplies to add facial features. Paint the body of the pencil and wrap it in colored pipe cleaners to resemble the animal's fur. The only limitation to creating an animal pencil is your imagination.

Things You'll Need

• Self-hardening clay
• Newspaper
• Pencil
• Petroleum jelly
• Felt
• String
• Googly eyes
• Cotton ball
• Paint
• Paint brush
• Scissors
• Sculpting tool
• Pipe cleaners
• Epoxy or hot glue

Instructions

1. Place a pencil onto a piece of newspaper to avoid making a mess. Paint the entire pencil with the exception of the eraser. Choose a paint color that will match the animal you plan to make. For example, paint black and orange strips for a tiger animal pencil. Allow an hour for the paint to dry.

2. Roll a ping-ball size chunk of self-hardening clay into a ball. Use your fingers to smooth out any cracks or indentations on the surface of the clay ball. Pick colored clay to match the color of your chosen animal.

3. Cover the eraser and ferrule (metal casing that encloses the eraser) of the pencil with a light coating of petroleum jelly. Push the clay ball onto the eraser and ferrule. Pinch the clay around the base of the ferrule to help keep it from falling off. The petroleum jelly allow you to remove the ball of clay from the pencil if desired.

4. Sculpt the clay ball to create an animal face. Create indentations for the eyes and place small circular pieces of felt inside the indentations. Secure the felt with a dab of epoxy or hot glue.

5. Add features of your chosen animals with string, felt, googly eyes or cotton balls. For example, add string whiskers, a felt nose and ears, googly eyes and a cotton ball tail if you are making a bunny animal pencil. Attach small felt triangle-shaped ears, string whiskers and oval felt eyes for a cat animal pencil.

6. Wrap a pipe cleaner in your animal's color around the body of the pencil. The fuzziness of the pipe cleaner will represent the animal's fur. Stick the top end of the pipe cleaner into the bottom portion of the clay to prevent it from falling down and off the pencil.

References

• Crayola: Wildlife Pencil Topper
• First Palette: Clay Pencil Pals Craft