DIY Butterfly Decorations

Swing into spring by making these gorgeous 3D paper DIY butterfly decorations! They are so fun and easy to make and you can decorate with them in all sorts of ways!

The first day of spring is almost here, can you feel it? Maybe not yet, but I am sure a lot of you have spring fever! These adorable DIY butterfly decorations will help to make it feel like spring in your home even if the temps don’t feel like it yet. 🙂

I decorated a spring vignette recently, which I will be sharing soon, and I wanted to include some butterflies. After all, butterflies usually remind us of spring, right?

In making the butterflies, I wanted it to look like they were flapping their wings while they were sitting there, so I decided to make more of a 3D paper butterfly. I really like how they turned out and the great thing is that they are totally customizable!

Coordinate the 3D paper butterflies to your decor

I choose some purple hues of cardstock to make my butterflies to coordinate with my spring vignette. However, you could make the butterflies with any patterned cardstock in any color! They can truly be tailored to any decor scheme. If you are not a fan of colors, then just use neutral colored cardstock. 🙂

I can imagine all sorts of uses for these butterflies! You could use them as wall art by arranging them on the wall in a flying pattern or adhere them to a canvas for beautiful art pieces. Another use is to simply place them around in a vignette like I did! I also think they would make an adorable wreath! Just add them to a simple grapevine wreath adorned with Spanish Moss and other greenery.

Supplies to make DIY butterfly decorations

*There are links to products in this post that I use or are similar to products I use. If you buy something from one of these links, I may make a small commission (with no additional cost to you) from the purchase. I will not recommend anything that I would not buy myself.

• Butterfly templates
• Colored or patterned cardstock of choice – I used this paper pack from Hobby Lobby. It was 4.5″ x 6.5″ in size, perfect to make butterflies. I also used this script scrapbook paper.
• Hot Glue Gun and Glue Sticks
• Scissors
• Hemp Cord

Watch the quick video

Don’t want to read all the instructions? I have included a video in this post showing you how to make these DIY butterfly decorations. If you can’t see the video, turn off your ad blocker. If you want more detailed instructions, continue reading.

Download the DIY butterfly templates

I have included this free download template of four different butterflies. Each butterfly comes in three sizes so you can use whichever size works best for what you are making. Just print the butterflies onto a piece of cardstock. Then using a pair of sharp scissors, cut out the butterfly templates. 

How to make DIY 3D paper butterflies

Using your chosen butterfly template, trace it onto your piece of colored/patterned paper or cardstock. To speed up this process, you can fold the paper in half so you will be cutting out two butterflies at once! 🙂

Here are a couple of cutting tips for you. Cut the butterfly out leaving the folded edge for last, this holds the two butterflies together until the end. Also, when cutting into a sharp corner, cut up to the corner, then come at it from the other directions. This allows for sharp corners. 😉 After cutting out the first set of butterflies, I noticed you could see the pen outline so I started to trace the template on the backside of the cardstock.

By folding the cardstock in half, you end up with two exact copies of the same butterfly! The only reason you would not want to do this is if you wanted to target a certain area of the pattern on your butterfly. Then you would have to trace it on that exact area. Since I was using more marbled looking paper, it did not matter. Plus, then you get to choose whichever butterfly pattern you like better for the top layer! 😉

Forming a 3D butterfly

I used 2-3 layers for each butterfly. Sometimes I would just use the two colored butterflies, and other times I would use a cream script patterned butterfly in between. I also used two script butterflies with a colored in between. Those turned out pretty too! Whichever you use, make sure they are from the same butterfly template.

To make antennae for the butterfly, I cut two small pieces of hemp cord of the same size. These ranged in size from 3/4″ to 1.5″. 

To achieve the 3D look, you will fold up the wings of the butterfly. This is easy to do by scoring a line where the wing meets the body of the butterfly. I just used my fingernail but you could also use something else with a blunt edge like a butter knife. Fold the wing all the way onto itself and let it go. Do the same thing for the other wing. Now the butterfly will appear like it has it’s wings up. Repeat this step with all the three layers of butterflies.

To assemble the butterfly, the first step is to glue on the antennae to the bottom layer. Place them so the antennae curve apart from each other. Next glue on each additional layer by adding hot glue only to the body portion of the butterfly. Try to place the butterflies directly over the previous layer.

Fold the wings slightly more forward in each layer. Now you have a butterfly that appears to be flapping it’s wings. 🙂

One additional optional step is to color in the body of the butterfly with a black Sharpie marker. I choose not to do this for most of the butterflies but did for a couple smaller ones.

Make lots of 3D paper butterflies

I got a little crazy with making these cute little butterflies! It was fun to see how each of the different patterned papers turned out.

They look super cute on my spring vignette, I will be sharing that with you soon! Do you have any ideas for these butterflies? I would love to see any projects you make!