DIY BLACK CAT PIÑATA: HOW TO MAKE AN EASY HALLOWEEN PIÑATA
DIY Black Cat Piñata
A fun homemade Halloween piñata made using recycled cardboard and simple craft supplies
We have a little Halloween party at home every year, and one of the things the children always look forward to is having a piñata.
Rather than buying one, I like to make our Halloween piñata myself. Over the years I've made a bat, ghost and pumpkin, and last year I decided to make this DIY Black Cat Piñata, complete with pink ears, a heart-shaped nose and a cute little face.
It's actually quite simple to make and you don't need a template or any specialist craft supplies. The main structure is made from old cardboard, then covered with fringed black tissue paper.
Here's how I made it.
What You Will Need
Cardboard
Black tissue paper
Pink card
White card
Masking tape
Glue stick
String
Scissors
Pen or pencil
Sweets to fill the piñata
For the main structure, I used waste cardboard. My husband works in a shop, so I asked him if he could bring home some cardboard that was going to be thrown away for us to use.
If you have any old cardboard boxes lying around the house, they would be perfect for this. You don't need nice new sheets of craft cardboard because it's all going to be covered with tissue paper anyway.
Step-by-Step Instructions
1. Draw and Cut the Cat Shape
Start by drawing a simple cat-head shape onto a large piece of cardboard.
I drew mine freehand with a large rounded head and two pointed ears at the top.
Don't worry about making it perfect. Once the piñata is covered in tissue paper, you won't notice any slightly wonky lines.
Carefully cut out your cat shape.
Place the cut-out cat onto another piece of cardboard and draw around it. Cut out this second shape so you have two matching pieces for the front and back of your piñata.
I didn't measure our finished piñata, so I can't give you an exact size. I simply made it to fit the cardboard I had available.
You can make yours as large or small as you like depending on the cardboard you have and how many sweets you want it to hold.
2. Cut the Cardboard Sides
Cut several long strips of cardboard 2 inches (5 cm) wide. These will create the sides and give your piñata its depth.
Try to keep all of the strips the same width. This is important because the second cat-shaped piece needs to sit evenly on top when you assemble the piñata.
If you have corrugated cardboard, I find this works particularly well for the sides. Cut your strips so that the corrugation runs across the 2 inch (5 cm) width of the strip, rather than along its length. This makes the cardboard much easier to bend and shape around the curves of the cat's head and ears.
The strips don't need to be the same length. Using several shorter pieces also makes it easier to work your way around the cat shape.
I usually make the sides of my piñatas 2 inches (5 cm) deep, which gives plenty of room inside for sweets without making the finished piñata too bulky.
3. Build the Piñata
Take one of your cat-shaped pieces and begin attaching the cardboard strips around the edge using masking tape.
Bend the cardboard as you go so that it follows the shape of the cat's head and ears. If you've cut the corrugated cardboard in the direction mentioned above, you should find it much easier to shape around the curves.
Continue around the cat, but leave a gap at the top between the ears. This is where you'll add the sweets later.
Once the side strips are in place, position the second cat-shaped piece on top. Because all of your cardboard strips are the same width, the second piece should sit evenly on top of them.
Attach it to the side strips using more masking tape and work your way around the edge until everything is securely taped together.
You should now have the basic 3D shape of your cat piñata, with an opening between the ears.
Don't worry if the cardboard and masking tape look a little messy at this point. It's all going to be hidden underneath the tissue paper.
4. Cut and Attach the Black Tissue-Paper Fringe
Cut your black tissue paper into long strips.
To make this much quicker, I layer several sheets of tissue paper together before cutting them into strips. I then stack several of the strips on top of each other and cut the fringe into them all at the same time.
This saves a lot of time compared with cutting every strip and every piece of fringe individually.
To make the fringe, make lots of little cuts along one edge of the stacked tissue-paper strips.
Don't cut all the way through – leave an uncut section along the top for the glue.
Once you've cut enough fringe, start near the bottom of the cat and use a glue stick to attach the first strip of tissue paper.
Add the next strip slightly above it so that the fringe overlaps the previous row. Continue adding overlapping rows as you work your way up the cat.
Cover the front, back and sides in the same way until you can no longer see the cardboard underneath.
You don't need to make the fringe particularly neat or have every row perfectly straight. The overlapping layers help to hide the cardboard underneath and give the finished cat its shaggy appearance.
My Glue Stick Tip
I used to attach the tissue paper to our homemade piñatas with a hot glue gun, but I've recently discovered that an ordinary glue stick does the job perfectly well for a piñata we're using for a party at home.
It's also much easier!
Using the hot glue gun took me longer, I would get through quite a few hot-glue sticks and, more often than not, I'd end up burning my fingers at some point.
I've found using an ordinary glue stick much quicker and cheaper, and it worked perfectly well for our black cat. I'll definitely be using this method for our future piñatas.
5. Make and Add the Cat's Face
Once the cat is completely covered in black tissue paper, you can add the face.
I kept mine really simple and used pink and white card.
I cut out:
Two white closed eyes with eyelashes
White whiskers
A pink heart-shaped nose
Two pink pieces for the inside of the ears
I drew and cut all of the pieces by hand. I didn't worry about making them completely accurate because I think the handmade look works really well for this.
If you have a Cricut, you could use it to cut the facial features instead. I have one myself, but for something this simple I found it much quicker just to cut them by hand.
Before sticking anything down, arrange all of the pieces on the front of the cat until you're happy with how the face looks.
Then use your glue stick to stick everything into place.
Your black cat should now be looking much more like a cat!
6. Add the Hanging String
Once I'd finished decorating the cat, I added the string for hanging it.
I make two small holes at the top of the piñata, one on either side of the opening between the ears that I left for adding the sweets. The holes only need to be just big enough for the string to pass through.
I made each hole by carefully pushing one blade of my scissors through the cardboard.
Feed one end of the string through each of the small holes. You can then reach through the larger opening between the ears, pull the two ends of the string out through the opening and tie them together.
Once the ends are tied together, the knot sits inside the piñata and you're left with a loop of string on the outside ready for hanging.
I always position the two string holes on either side of the sweets opening because having that larger opening there makes it really easy to reach the ends of the string and tie them together.
I didn't add any extra reinforcement around the holes. The cardboard itself was enough for ours.
If you're making the piñata with children, this is a step for an adult to do because you're using the point of the scissors to make the holes.
7. Fill Your DIY Black Cat Piñata With Sweets
When you're ready for your Halloween party, it's time for the most important part – the sweets!
We filled ours through the opening I'd left between the cat's ears, and the children helped put all the sweets inside.
There's no need to close the opening afterwards. I simply left ours open.
How many sweets you need will depend on the size of your piñata and how many people are going to be taking part.
8. Hang It Up and Enjoy!
Normally we tie our Halloween piñata to the washing line outside and take turns hitting it.
Unfortunately, it was raining for last year's Halloween party, so taking a tissue-paper-covered black cat outside wasn't really an option!
Instead, we had to improvise.
We hung the piñata from a sweeping brush and Daddy held it up while we took turns hitting it. When it was Daddy's turn to have a go, I held the sweeping brush instead.
One thing we've discovered from making our own piñatas is that they're surprisingly strong! Even though they're only made from cardboard and masking tape, ours can take us quite a while to break open, which means everyone gets plenty of turns before the sweets finally come tumbling out.
If you're having a go yourself, just make sure everyone else stands well back while somebody is taking their turn.
Making Our Own Halloween Piñatas
Making our own piñata has become one of the little traditions we have as part of our family Halloween parties.
We've now made a bat, ghost, pumpkin and black cat, and I love that they're made largely from cardboard that would otherwise have been thrown away.
You don't need to make the cardboard underneath look perfect either. The fringed tissue paper hides a multitude of sins!
They're simple to make, don't need lots of expensive craft supplies and, judging by how long it can take us to get into them, they're much stronger than they look.
Now I just need to decide what Halloween piñata I'm going to make next!
Happy crafting!
🎥 Watch Me Make the DIY Black Cat Piñata
If you’d like to see how I made our DIY Black Cat Piñata, you can watch the process in Weekly Vlog #429, along with everything else we got up to that week. The piñata-making starts at 6:49, so you can skip straight to that part if you just want to see how I made it.
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