This taco craft is SO CUTE, and it’s really easy to make, just like the food itself. Use colourful construction paper to make a taco that opens up to show a hidden message inside!
These DIY paper tacos are the perfect gift for taco lovers. Send the card for a funny (or punny – check below for some fun taco puns!) Valentine’s Day card, birthday card, or just to say you’re thinking of someone!
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How to Make a Taco Craft
Materials:
- Construction paper (full piece of yellow; scraps of red, bright yellow, brown, and green)
- 2 Googly eyes (10 mm or size of choice)
- Glue tape
- Brown colored pencil
- Black Sharpie marker
Equipment:
Check Out The Video Tutorial:
Instructions:
Step 1: Find what you need
- Gather your supplies and materials.
Step 2: Make the taco shells
- Fold a full sheet of yellow construction paper in half lengthwise.
- Then fold the paper in half again in the other direction
- Draw a semi-circle taco shape on the edge of the paper, making sure you have the folded edges at the bottom.(Our taco is about 2-1/2 inches tall in the center.)
- Cut out the taco shape through the layers of paper.
- This will give you two taco shells! Set one aside - we'll need it later.
- Draw dots and lines on the front of the taco shell with a brown pencil crayon.
Step 3: 'Prepare' the toppings
- Cut an inch wide strip of red construction paper and fold it accordion style every inch, giving you at least five layers of paper.
- Cut a circle out of the folded red paper to make tomato slices.
- Cut an inch wide strip from bright yellow paper and cut 10 thin strips off of it. (These strips should be between 1/8 and 1/4 inch wide.) You now have grated cheese!
- Cut an inch wide strip of brown construction paper. Fold it accordion style every 1-1/2 inches and cut out little 'cloud' shapes for pieces of taco meat.
- Finally, cut an inch wide strip of green construction paper. Fold it accordion style every 1-1/2 inches and cut out long wavy strips for lettuce pieces.
Step 4: Add the toppings into the taco shell
- Open the taco shell you decorated and place the coloured side face down towards you. Add a line of glue tape (or use a glue stick) on the far side.
- Start adding toppings to the taco, placing them on the glue tape and making sure that they overlap and stick out about 1/2 inch from the taco.
- Continue gluing toppings around the top edge of the taco, overlapping the ingredients until the taco is full.
Step 5: Add the second taco shell
- Grab the second taco shell and place it fold up. Add glue tape around the edges of the entire circle, then add some in the middle as well.
- Line up the folds of the two paper taco shells then press the second one inside the first shell with the toppings.You've created a taco card!
- Use a Sharpie (or whatever pen you'd like) to write a fun taco-themed message inside the card!
Step 6: Add a smiling face to the taco
- Add googly eyes to the center front of the taco card using glue tape.
- Draw a smile in pencil crayon below the eyes, and little curved eyebrows above them.
- Your taco craft is complete!
Helpful Tips:
- For each taco card you’ll need at least five pieces each of tomato, lettuce, and ground beef, and ten pieces of shredded cheese. Add even more to make your taco look more full!
- You can also add brown dots and lines to the back of the card so that both sides look like a real taco shell!
What paper is best to make a taco craft?
We used construction paper to make our taco card because it’s a great, inexpensive paper for kids to use. (We used pastel orange printer paper for the grated cheese). You can also use coloured cardstock if you’d like your card to be heavier and more sturdy.
There are a lot of ways to get creative with paper, such as using textured scrapbook paper for the taco shell. Or try crumpling pieces of green tissue paper for the lettuce! And if you don’t have coloured paper, draw on white printer paper with crayons or colored pencils to make the ingredients!
What other toppings can I add to my taco craft?
We’ve added ground beef, lettuce, tomatoes, and shredded cheese to our taco, but you can definitely add all kinds of other toppings.
Try making black beans or black olives out of black paper, bell pepper slices out of orange paper, and spoonfuls of sour cream out of white paper! Or why not try to make green onions, red onions, or even guacamole?!
What are some good puns or sayings for the inside of the paper taco card?
A lot of fun taco puns use taco / “taco ’bout” in place of the word “talk”, such as…
- “Let’s taco ’bout how awesome you are”
- “Taco ’bout a good friend”
- “Let’s taco ’bout your birthday”
- “Long time no taco”
- “Give ’em something to taco ’bout”
- “Lettuce taco ’bout how great you are! I love you from my head tomatoes”
You can also use “fantas-taco” instead of the word “fantastic”, or “spec-taco-ular” for “spectacular”, like…
- “Have a fantas-taco day”
- “You’re so fantas-taco!”
- “You’re such a spec-taco-ular person”
Or just reference tacos in a general way, with…
- “We go together like tacos and Tuesday!”
- “I love you more than tacos! (And that says a lot.)”
Tacos are a lot of people’s favourite food, so why not make a pretend paper taco craft?! It’s so adorable!
These cards are also a fun craft for Cinco de Mayo, Taco Tuesday, or National Taco Day (yes, this exists! It’s October 4 in the United States, in case you’re wondering).
Here’s even more paper craft ideas:
Our book Low-Mess Crafts for Kids is loaded with 72 fun and simple craft ideas for kids! The projects are fun, easy and most importantly low-mess, so the clean up is simple!
Where to buy:
You can purchase Low-Mess Crafts for Kids from Amazon, or wherever books are sold:
Amazon |  Barnes and Noble |  Books- A- Million |  Indiebound |  Indigo |  Amazon Canada
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