This stand-up donkey is ready to carry Mary to Bethlehem or to take his place in a nativity scene.

You will need:

• Coloured card (brown or grey best) or white card to be coloured in
• Wool
• Glue
• Coloured pens, pencils or crayons
• Googly eyes (optional)

In advance, cut out donkey shapes from a piece of A4 card folded in half.  Make sure the fold runs along the top of the donkey’s back.  If you are cunning you can put the legs and ears in slightly different positions on each half of the donkey. Mine isn’t very anatomically accurate, but here is the template.

Cut up lengths of wool for the tail and shorter pieces for the mane.

The children should put glue inside the head and along the edge behind the ears where the mane is to go.  Lay a line of short strands of wool on the glue between the ears and the back, sticking out. Then fold the donkey to stick two sides of the head together and hold the mane in place.

Similarly at the rear end of the donkey put in some glue to hold the tail (I used 3 strands of wool) and a little more glue below the tail to stick the donkey’s bottom together and stop the tail from disappearing inside.

Draw on face (stick googly eyes if you like) and colour in hooves. If your donkey is not the colour you want, colour it in.

As the glue, we hope, is only at the top of the donkey, you should be able to pull the legs apart slightly so that the donkey will stand up. Make a slight crease if necessary to keep it standing upright.

Story: Mary and Joseph go to Bethlehem (Luke 2: 1-6)

This craft could also be used on Palm Sunday, of course, in which case you may want to add fabric pieces to represent the cloaks spread on the donkey’s back for Jesus to sit on.