This intrepid bear marionette marches over all obstacles in our library landscape… searching for new friends and a cozy place to call home!
We read Otto the Book Bear by Katie Cleminson (Disney Hyperion, 2011). Otto the Bear is a character in a book. He possesses the delightful ability to come to life and rove outside his book. Otto explores the house, reads, and journals on the family typewriter. When his book is tragically overlooked when the family moves away, Otto decides to strike out on his own. But it’s a big world for a tiny bear, and he soon grows downhearted. But what’s this? A building full of light, hope, and characters like him? Now, Otto lives in the library with tons of new friends and readers. He is a very happy bear!
You’ll need:
- 1 small box (ours was 4″ x 4″ x 4″ – a small tissue box works too)
- String
- Brown construction paper
- 1 wooden dowel
- 2 large plastic buttons
- 3 toilet paper tubes
- Red felt (optional)
- Scissors and tape for construction
- Hole punch
- Hot glue
This marionette is designed with simplicity in mind! First, cut the bottom off a small box.Then cut the box down to about 2.25″ tall. Punch two holes in the top of the box, and thread a 29″ piece of string up and out of both holes like so:
Tie the free ends of the string to a wooden dowel rod. If the top of your box has a lid like ours did, make sure to tape it down tightly.
Next up, the bear’s face! The snout is half a toilet paper tube with a circle of brown construction paper covering one end. Hot glue the snout in place, then add a plastic button nose, a pair of wiggle eyes, and ears. We made the ears (and the bear’s tail) out of the extra cardboard we cut from the box earlier.
To make the bear’s legs, cut 2 toilet paper tubes in half. Punch 2 holes in the top of a half, then thread a 10″ piece of string through the holes like this:
Repeat the above steps with the remaining three legs, then tape all 4 legs to the inside “ceiling” of the box. Here’s a shot of the underside of the box with the leg strings taped in place.
Did you notice the black button in the image above? We hot glued that to the inside rear of the bear to counterbalance the button on the bear’s snout. It helps keep the marionette from leaning forward too much.
In the book, Otto wears a handsome red messenger bag. We crafted our bags out of red felt, using hot glue to seal the sides. A little piece of black masking tape held the bag closed.
When the bear marionettes were finished, we encouraged kids to pull books off the shelves and use them to create mountains, walls, ramps, bridges, and paths for their bears to travel across. A few kids also made cozy little places for the bear to nap. Awwwww!
We read Pilot Pups, written by Michelle Meadows, and illustrated by Dan Andreasen (Simon & Schuster, 2008). Join a pair of enthusiastic stuffed dogs as they fly through the house in a toy plane. Dodging mountaintops (Dad’s head), encountering fog (tea kettle), and careening past the creek (kitchen sink), and returning to the bed before anyone notices their daring adventures.
First, fold the rounded part of the template upwards and inwards, so it tucks under the back of the template. Later, this will be the bill of your aviator hat.
Hold the template to your forehead and curve the long ends around your head. Secure the ends together with staples. This is the headband of your hat (and, if the template band doesn’t go all the way around your head, just add a little extender piece in the back).
Next, fold the right and left flaps over the top of your head. Secure them together with staples. Note: you want the flaps to form a bit of a “dome” over your head, not fit super tight on top of your skull.
Fold the the center flap down over the top of your head, gently tucking it into the back of the hat brim. Trim off any excess flap sticking out from under the brim.
That’s your hat, now for the rest of the costume! The wings are super simple. We cut pairs of 9.5″ x 16″ wings from white poster board, which the kids decorated with markers, 
The propeller belt is a strip of poster board with holes punched in each end. Wrap the belt around your waist and secure it in place with a snippet of ribbon (decorate with markers and color masking tape of you like to) threaded through the belt holes. You can simply attach a poster board propeller to the front, or you can make it spin by using a 
A lighthouse shines in the darkness, allowing your little boat to safely navigate our story time waters – which look surprisingly like blue contact paper. Huh. Who knew the ocean came in long, rectangular sheets?
The most important part of this lighthouse is the light! You can put an LED votive or a mini glow stick in there and be done. But we wanted two things: 1) The top of the lighthouse to rotate; and 2) The light inside to “spotlight” like a real lighthouse. So I grabbed a bunch of submersible LED lights from the floral section of Michaels Craft (bring a 40% off coupon, because these are pricey at $20 for 12).
First, wedge one end of a 4.5″ craft stick into the clip on the back of the LED light. Next, cut a slit in the top of a soft plastic cocktail cup. Thread the free end of the craft stick up through the slit in the cup. Finish by adding a masking tape or construction paper flag to the top of the craft stick.
Next up, the sailboat! Cut the top and/or lid off a small box, then hot glue 2 poster board strips on each side of the box. Pinch and hot glue the free ends of the poster board together in the front and back to create a boat shape. Tape a string to the top front of the boat (if you tape the string to the bottom, the boat will keep capsizing).
Next, use scissors to enlarge the hole of a foam bead. You want the hole large enough to hold a drinking straw. Hot glue the foam bead to the front of the boat. Note how the foam bead is not centered in the boat – it’s glued a little ways towards the front:
Why is the foam bead slightly forwards in the boat? So you can fit your toilet paper tube person behind the sail of the boat (though if you use a slightly larger box, this might not be an issue).
To finish the boat, use a hole punch to create holes in the top and bottom of a triangle of white construction paper. Decorate the sail with markers, then thread it through a drinking straw. Insert the bottom of the straw into the foam bead (we also recommend a masking tape or construction paper flag to the top of the mast to keep the sail from popping off). Use construction paper and markers to decorate the boat and a toilet tube person.
The kids pulled their boats along the pathway, which was lit by beautiful little lighthouses…