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[For Seniors] Fun February Crafts: Ideas Inspired by Setsubun, Valentine’s Day, and Other Events
February is a season filled with heartwarming events like Setsubun, Valentine’s Day, and Cat Day.
How about enjoying some crafts with construction paper and origami in a warm room on a cold day? Making things like ogre-themed pellet drums, heart-shaped accessories, or dangling plum-blossom decorations lets you move your fingers while savoring a touch of nostalgia, naturally bringing out smiles.
Displaying your finished pieces at home will brighten the atmosphere and make it feel more festive.
Here are some easy, charming craft ideas for February that you can try right away.
For Seniors: Fun Crafts for February. Ideas inspired by events like Setsubun and Valentine’s Day (1–10)
Wall ornament of camellia sasanqua and narcissus
Let’s try making three-dimensional paper flowers with origami.
With this idea, you can create camellias for the cold season and daffodils.
The process is to cut out petal and leaf parts from origami paper and then glue them together.
You can download the templates from the description, so please make use of them.
For the winter camellia petals, use scissors or a pen to gently curl the back so they form an arch.
This will give them the characteristically rounded camellia shape.
Once your camellias and daffodils are finished, arrange them nicely on a backing sheet or a wall and enjoy the display.
Setsubun wreath made with yarn
In February, the first big event is Setsubun! To get ready for it, how about making a cute, cozy wreath using yarn? First, crumple about three tissues into a ball.
Wrap the ball with yarn in your favorite color to make a sphere.
If you want to make red or blue oni (ogres), use red or blue yarn; if you want to represent beans, use beige-toned yarn.
For the oni spheres, attach felt pieces to create the face and hair.
Make about eight spheres in the same way, arrange them in a wreath shape as you like, and glue them together with a hot glue gun.
Add decorations like plum blossoms if you like, attach a string to hang it on the wall, and you’re done.
Pop-up 3D chocolate card
Let’s handmake a message card for Valentine’s Day that’s so tempting it makes you want to take a bite.
First, fold a piece of brown construction paper in half to use as the base of the card.
Next, cut out a chocolate base sized to fit the cover, and, imagining a chocolate bar, cut out as many small block-shaped chocolate pieces as you need.
Use thick double-sided tape to attach the block-shaped chocolates to the chocolate base, then wrap aluminum foil over them so that the chocolates are about half covered.
Wrap your favorite patterned origami paper over that to represent the wrapper, add a ribbon, and attach it to the card’s cover to finish.
Inside the card, glue a piece of white paper and write your message.
Wreath of plum blossoms and bush warblers
Here’s a craft that brings a touch of spring in February, when we start longing for its arrival.
You’ll make parts like a bush warbler, plum blossoms, a plum branch, a wreath, and a base to attach the bird and blossoms.
Everything is made with origami, so feel free to choose springlike colors for the wreath and base.
The wreath is made by combining eight sheets of origami paper.
You can use all the same color, or alternate colors and patterns—either is fine.
Arrange the parts as you like, vary the number of plum blossoms, and enjoy completing your design.
Oni roly-poly doll
In February for Setsubun, let’s make an ogre-themed roly-poly toy.
Inflate a balloon to the size you want, then use diluted glue to stick torn pieces of shoji paper onto the surface.
Layer the paper so it’s three to five sheets thick, then brush on more glue and let it dry.
Once it’s completely dry, pop the balloon and drop some glue and a marble into the hollow shell to weight and fix it.
Finally, decorate it with hair and horns to make it look like an oni, and you’re done.
It takes time to dry, so it’s nice that you can enjoy the process at a relaxed pace.
Ear Pendants
Let me introduce a decorative Otafuku (good-luck) ornament you can make with origami.
The steps are very simple, so you can finish it quickly.
You’ll need construction paper for the base, white paper, and origami paper in red, black, pink, yellow, plus a Japanese-patterned sheet.
First, glue the construction paper and white paper together to create the base.
Then, cut the Otafuku hair from the black origami paper, cut round cheek pieces from the pink paper, and attach them to the base.
From the remaining papers, cut out circles in different sizes, layer them to form flowers, and use them to decorate the hair and open spaces.
Finally, draw Otafuku’s facial features with a pen to complete it.
The key tip is to tear the origami pieces by hand instead of using scissors when cutting out the parts.
This gives the piece a more charming, handcrafted look.
Daffodil wall decoration
How about brightening up your winter interiors with origami daffodils? The steps are simple, making this a great project for seniors to try.
Start by making three petal pieces from white origami paper.
The creasing steps are important here, so take your time and fold carefully.
Once the folding is done, draw the petal shapes and cut them out with scissors.
Punch a hole in the center of each of the three petal pieces, then insert a yellow origami cone (the corona) to complete the daffodil.
You’ll need two sets of petal pieces for each daffodil, so prepare as many as you need for the number of flowers you want to make.
Create the stem from green origami paper, and finish by arranging the daffodils on a frame base made of origami.