Once upon a time I featured a post from Hank + Hunt, here, for her DIY animal candle holders. I blame that post for ooh’ing and ahh’ing over plastic animals every time I see them now (nerd alert*). Since I apparently have a new found love for them, I thought I would come up with a project where I could use them for more than just birthday candles, and hence, decided to make them into these DIY Party Animal Magnets.
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* for the safety of your reputation, never announce over the phone that you are “cutting up animals”, it gets awkward until you thoroughly explain yourself..
- Plastic animals ($1 each at the dollar store)
- Scissors
- Super glue
- Plastic/bottle caps
- Spray paint
- Magnet circles
1 | Cut the plastic animals in half with scissors, it’s surprisingly easy.
2 | Insert the caps into the open end of the animals.
3 | Spray paint them the color of your choice.
4 | Super glue the magnet to the back, and be sure to push in the cap far enough to for the magnet to be flush with the animal, I learned this by trial and error :)
What to use in case bottle caps don’t fit into your plastic animal:
- -air dry clay
- -thick cardboard cut-outs
Nadia
06.07.12
These are amazing! Definitely going to add it to my crafts to-do list :)
Ashley said:
Let me know how they turn out :)
jewel7013
06.07.12
My first glance at these reminded me of all the men I have known who are avid hunters who love to display their trophies on the wall…
This is Taxidermy innovation at its best…:)
Adrian
06.07.12
Hey girl! I saw these animals chopped in half on instagram and now I’m glad to see where you were going with them.
Ashley said:
Hopefully they look much better than my Instagram photo :)
Renee
06.07.12
Need to do the magnets with the butt of the animals too – oh so cute!
Ashley said:
Haha, I agree! Hubby wanted me to use the butts, but I decided to stick with heads to make them seem more adult :)
Glenda said:
If you do both, I could see some amazing animal creations from the kiddos.. Hippo head, tiger butt…tiger head, horse butt…. fun stuff.
Hilary
06.08.12
These are seriously cute!!!
Ashley said:
Thanks, Hil! :)
nikki
06.18.12
I love that you spray painted them all one color! Looks great! Thanks for sharing!
Ashley said:
Thanks, Nikki!
Kate
08.06.12
Freaking Awesome!! xx
mollie
11.13.12
love these!! so much fun:) Question… what if the animals aren’t the perfect size for a bottle cap to fit inside as the base? Any other ideas of how you attach the magnets?
Ashley said:
You could use air-dry clay to fill the inside and it would definitely give it a really put together look. Or you could even use thick cardboard cutouts!
Mackenzie
06.20.13
Thanks so much for posting how to do this. I saw these on etsy and said I bet I could make those myself. :) I’m going to make them as wedding favors/ escort or place card holders!
Mackenzie
06.20.13
Btw I’m pinning this :)
Zoe Bleak (@zoebleak)
02.11.15
Have you had a problem with the caps+magnets falling out when pulling it off a metal surface? Or do the caps stay plugged inside the animal pretty well? Would you suggest using super glue for the cap as well?
Artuss
03.19.15
Hey ,
What spray paint did you used?
I sprayed figures with simple gold paint and it’s not drying at all. Must be the rubbery material.
Thanks