Gaius (3 John)

This is a really lovely craft to show off to parents and friends at the end of the session, once complete the children seem to walk out with just an envelope, but inside a little pop up scene of Gaius receiving the letter from John appears.

This craft is a little delicate to construct, so not suitable for very young children. I would recommend printing in colour so children can take more time and care in cutting and construction. While the cuts don’t have to be exact, the more accurate the scissor work and folding, the better the card will operate.

All you need to make this little pop up card is a pair of scissors, a ‘non-liquid’ glue stick, and a single sheet printout. The finished craft is approximately 10x8cm if printed on an A4 sheet of paper. Do not allow your printer to stretch the template. Links – Colour PDF, no colour PDF.

Start by cutting all the pieces with glue tabs. These are white on the colour printout. You then need to fold each piece along all the straight lines. These pieces will form the mechanism.

I’ll walk you though the first mechanism slowly:

Start with the clouds support. This is the blue strip, or the strip with the most fold lines. This needs to make an ‘M’ shape fold as shown in the picture.

One end has a symbol on the glue tab part. add a little glue to just this end and attach it to the corresponding square in the sky.

Once in place it’s important that you make sure your support lays flat.

There is only one square because slight differences in folding and cutting would make the other gluing spot more unpredictable. To secure the other end add glue to the remaining glue tab and fold the card flat.

When you open the card you will see the mechanism forms a slightly raised table in the sky. This method of gluing one tab and folding the card to secure the other will be used for all the remaining pieces.

Now for the house. This also supports the tree and the character. Glue the support strips to the walls of the house first.

Construct the roof next, it’s a simple glue tab. Do try not to get glue on the folds.

Time to put everything together. The trick is to complete one piece at a time. Start with the house. Add glue to both tabs. Flatten the other supports out the way and fold the envelope closed.

Repeat this process for the 2 supports attached to the house. Make sure you flatten the supports by the middle fold as you glue them in place.

Now your mechanisms are in in place add the decorations. The last fold is for the clouds – this should be lined up with the fold in the support. If you haven’t done so already stick on the outside on the envelope too.

(There is a video of this card opening and closing on the facebook page)