It’s sky-high adventure at a our steampunk story time! These amazing airships with matching goggles are a cinch, thanks to our ready-made templates and a few sparkly extras!
We read Zephyr Takes Flight by Steve Light (Candlewick Press, 2012). Zephyr loves airplanes. She draws them, plays with them, and aims to fly one someday. But when an exuberant triple loop-de-loop spectacular ends with a crash in the living room, she is grounded in her room. That’s when Zephyr discovers a door behind her dresser that leads to the most wondrous place she’s ever seen. A hangar filled with paper, pens, plans, and amazing flying machines! She takes a test flight, but is forced to crash land in mountains inhabited by flying pigs. There she meets Rumbus, a little pig who can’t fly. Clever Zephyr builds Rumbus some wings, and in exchange, Rumbus and his family help her fly back home. She arrives just in time to hear her parents calling her for a triple-hug, triple-pancake, spectacular.
You’ll need:
- 1 rectangle of white poster board (approximately 8.5″ x 11″)
- 1 paper bag
- 1 small box (mine was 2″ x 3″ x 3″)
- 4 pieces of twisteez wire for the airship’s basket (approximately 5.5″ long)
- 1 piece of twisteez wire for the airship’s carrying loop (approximately 9″ long)
- 1 piece of twisteez wire for goggle strap (approximately 17″ long)
- Templates, printed on 8.5″ x 11″ white card stock (more on these later!)
- A selection of sparkle stems
- A selection of metallic dot stickers
- Hole punch, scissors, tape, stapler, glue for construction
- Metallic markers for decorating
We’ll begin with the poster board framework that houses your airship’s balloon! Start with an 8.5″ x 11″ piece of poster board in landscape orientation. Fold the poster board from left to right.
Starting from the folded end, make four, 4.25″ long cuts. Each cut should end about an inch from the end of the paper. These will form the “struts” of your airship’s framework.
Unfold the poster board and flip it over. Currently, your struts have 1 central crease. You’re going to need to add 2 more creases on each strut (one on either side of the central crease). The new creases should be about 2.5″ away from the central crease.
Below you can see the poster board with 1 central crease. The strut at the very bottom, however, has 3 creases.
Crease all the struts, then circle the poster board and staple both ends. Your airship framework should now look like this:
Punch four holes in one of the struts. This is where your airship’s basket will attach later.
Now for the balloon! Open, then crumble, a paper bag. The more wrinkly the bag, the better it looks! Keeping the bag crumpled, slip it between the struts. Gently fluff the bag to fill out the framework.
Originally, I asked the kids to pull the bag apart with their fingers. But one mom came up with this clever maneuver. She pulled the opening of the bag through one end of the framework and briskly blew into the bag to inflate it. Genius!
I have to say, that’s got to be the weirdest blog photo yet. And that’s saying a lot. Come to think of it, doesn’t it look a bit like a steampunk asthma inhaler?
Time to attach the basket! If necessary, cut the lid and tabs off a small box, then punch a hole in each corner. Secure four, 5.5″ pieces of twisteez wire to the holes. Attach the other ends to the holes in the strut.
You’ll notice that the airship in the above photo has a hanging loop at the top. That’s a 9″ piece of twisteez wire circled around the top strut. Secure the loop to the underside of the strut with tape.
At this point, your ship is done and it’s time to decorate! There are tons of things to choose from in the templates below:
Bird wings, butterflies, gears template
Gears, little wings template
Big wings, little wings template
Medium wings and rudders template
Goggle template
Assorted propellers
Originally, the templates were created by artist Aliisa Lee for a steampunk hat craft (except the assorted propellers, airship wing and rudders – I, ahem, drew those chunky little things). We reused the templates for this miraculous mechanism. Now we’re using them for airships. It just goes to show the elegance and versatility that is steampunk.
To allow kids lots of creative time, we prepped the airship frameworks in advance. We also cut out various items from the templates and stuck them in individual buckets and baskets for easy browsing.
If you’re using a bucket, it helps to stick a little picture of the item on the front, for kids who are too short to lean over and peer inside.
These buckets are great for organizing art supplies. I found them in the bulk candy section of Party City when I was researching red buckets for this Kate Wetherall project. As Kate has proven time and time again, they are super handy! We also offered sparkle stems, metallic markers, extra twisteez wire, and metallic dot stickers for a little bling.
To make goggles, simply color a pair from the template, punch holes on the ends, and knot a 17″ piece of twisteez wire through both holes. Adjust for size, and perch the goggles on top of your head like a headband. Some kids, however, cut holes in their goggle’s eye pieces, which were incredibly adorable. Look at this duo!
We read Meet The Dullards, written by Sara Pennypacker and illustrated by Daniel Salmieri (HarperCollins, 2015). The Dullard kids (Blanda, Borely, and Little Dud) are causing trouble. For starters, they’re – gasp – reading circus books instead of staring at blank pieces of paper! And last week, their parents caught them trying to play outside! Things are getting so chaotic, the Dullards decide to move to a less exciting neighborhood. But while Mr. and Mrs. Dullard are (literally) watching the paint dry on their news walls, the kids sneak outside to play circus. This is just too much! The Dullards move back to their old neighborhood. As Mr. and Mrs. Dullard fall asleep, they feel assured that their lives are finally back to being perfectly boring. The kids, however, have other plans. They’ve joined the circus.
Next, we made a dull toilet paper tube person. Here, I used the book’s illustrations as a guide. Grey clothes, black hair, etc. I only offered one kind of eye sticker too! We don’t want any overstimulating variations on eyes now, do we?
Your dull house and person are finished. Set them aside. Pick up the second house facade…and go CRAZY! We brought out the 
Our decorating supplies included 
When the exciting house facades are finished, hot glue them to one side of a large tissue box. Hot glue the dull facade to the other side of the box. Twirl the box around to view the dull and exciting sides. And speaking of exciting sides, check out these masterpieces…
You had a sneak peek 
Upon arrival, the kids were greeted by our “maidservant” (otherwise known as Anna, a sophomore at Princeton). Anna stayed in character the entire time. Let me tell you, she does an extremely authentic curtsy and fantastically demure “Yes ma’am.” She shares about her experience 
When everyone had arrived, I was officially announced by Anna. I sashayed into the room, greeted everyone, and proceeded to do a 15 minute PowerPoint presentation on the history of tea in England.
The historical content and connections for this program were quite extensive, and this post is already going to be rather long. So I’m going to describe the historical content in very broad brushstrokes. At the program, kids learned how tea was initially an expensive import available only to the upper class. It was also heavily taxed (sometimes over 100%). This resulted in a roaring trade in smuggled and adulterated tea. However, as tea became more affordable, it was enjoyed by all the citizens of England.
To the dining room where our splendid tea table was laid out!
Waiting at each chair was a unique teacup and saucer. The kids got to take home these cups and saucers as mementos. They were so excited.
The take-home teacup was something I really, really wanted to do when I first conceptualized this program. So I sent a request through our library’s 
I also stopped by Nearly New, a local thrift store/consignment shop. They completely hooked me up with some delightful cups and saucers.
I couldn’t resist demonstrating tea pods as well. Have you seen these things? They are dried herbal pods you drop into hot water, and they “bloom” as they steep in the hot water. I first spotted one in Sophia Coppola’s movie Marie Antoinette. As luck would have it, Infini-T, our local tea shop, had them!
I was stationed next to the urn, offering milk and sugar. I can’t resist sharing this little history fact…way back when, sugar came in big cones you had to break apart with a special tool called sugar nippers. This resulted in irregular lumps of sugar. Hence the question “one lump or two?”
Having coached the kids on Victorian etiquette earlier in the program, I am happy to report that our young ladies and gentleman did very well indeed. Napkins were on laps, voices were not raised. We conversed very genially about their activities, interests, holiday doings, and travel adventures.
To play “Hunt the Thimble,” have everyone leave the room except for one person. That person must hide a thimble somewhere in the room (however, it must be in plain view and not hidden behind anything). The players reenter the room and silently begin searching. If you spot the thimble, you immediately sit on the floor. The last person standing must pay a forfeit.
And now, for the crowning glory of the program. Joani, who is in Glee Club, agreed to research and perform some popular period music pieces. She sang two, including “How Doth the Little Crocodile.” The song is, of course, the poem from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland set to music. It’s from a rare 1872 Alice in Wonderland songbook from our special collections.
We asked these kids to sit and look “proper.”
And check out the breeches on the young gentleman! I do believe those are modified baseball pants. That, my friends, is innovation.
But this “dress up” took the Wonderland cake. Behold the queen of hearts!
So how did the Victorian tea program go over? Amazingly well. Astonishingly well. We had a jolly good time I tell you! And while I loved the setting, the teacups, the costumes, and the cupcakes, the best part for me was how much history was packed in with the fun. Honestly, I don’t think any of them will ever look at a cup of tea in the same way again.