Book Page Butterfly Wall Art

Awhile back I bought some old books from my local library, and I had no idea what to do with them. Until now....  
For this project you will need:

• Old book pages ( I had one in large print )
• note cards
• pen 
• scissors
• old eye shadow ( make sure you really don't want these afterwards)
• white school glue 
• paint brush 
• manila folder
• gold glitter nail polish 
• Double sided tape (I just used masking tape)
• top of a water bottle 
• water 

First you'll take a note card and fold it in half and draw half a butterfly. Now cut that out and fold another card and trace that half on it. Then decide how much smaller you want the second one to be. Draw and cut, then repeat for a even smaller butterfly. For the dragonflies fold and cut out a heart for the wings and a body like shape.... for the body. Anyway moving on to the main attraction. The Giant Butterfly!!!I taped two note card together (and a little extra) and drew half of the butterfly. Next I folded the manila folder in half and trace. Then I cut it out and admire my butterfly. I also cut out a more round shaped butterfly too.

Now rip out some not all of our book pages and rip them even more into small pieces. With a paintbrush, brush on the white glue and glue down the pieces you just ripped up until the butterfly is covered.  Glue in small sections so the glue doesn't dry up. Don't worry about the edges, just keep gluing. We'll fix that later. Once it is covered apply one coat of glue just to make sure. Let it dry in a open book so it can get a little bend in the wings. After it's done drying cut the pieces of pages that are hanging over the edge. They don't belong there. 

Trace many butterflies, and try to get as many as you can on one page. Did I mention that you'll now have to cut out many butterflies of different sizes? No, well now cut them out . Like so. Tip: trace once cut twice. I mean trace once on a page and cut more than one layer. With some of the butterflies I wanted layers. So just fold a small one and glue it to the middle of a bigger one.  For the dragonflies take two hearts and glue them to the center back of the body. Or cut the hearts in half and glue them with a slight gap. I also made some flowers too. I glued a little circle on both sides so they would hold better. After all of this you'll have a big' ol pile of butterflies.

Now mix 1 part water and 1 part glue into the cap, then add about 1 part eyeshadow. For the darker edges of the big butterfly, use a dark brown or any dark shade. For the dragonflies and all the other butterflies use a lighter mixture. After the big butterfly dried I used my finger to shade the wings with a medium shade. Then I used the gold glitter nail polish to paint the high points of the butterfly. The reason for the small cap is to make sure that the glue doesn't dry while painting. It helps to fold the butterflies in half and then paint them, so it'll have a little curve. For the flowers I made a thicker mixture to paint the with. 

Now take the masking tape and double it over and tape each and every butterfly. Or just use double sided tape. Arrange the butterflies around the Big one. And now you're done!!