How to Make a DIY Father’s Day Puzzle Card

By Grandma Sandy | May 27, 2026 |

I’m always looking for ways the grandkids can make more interesting greeting cards than simply drawing a picture and writing a message inside. So, this year, N, who will be 10 in a few months, was enlisted to make an interactive DIY Father’s Day card.

Child lists the ways he appreciates his dad as the first step in making a DIY Father's Day card. — **Start by listing all the things dad does for you that you appreciate.**

The idea was this: N would come up with a list of what he appreciated about his dad. We’d turn each idea into a puzzle that dad would have to solve to get the message. We’d create a small book from these puzzles, which would become N’s Father’s Day card.

While ours was an ambitious project featuring several puzzles, your child could create just one of the puzzles and still have a DIY Father’s Day card to be proud of.

First, Create the Book

Cover of the Father's Day card features a heart. The card is a small book, held together by hole-punching the spine and threading with ribbon. — **N’s card cover features a heart.**

For our DIY Father’s Day Card, I used sturdy mixed media paper. Any fairly thick paper like light cardstock or construction paper will do. By folding the sheet into quarters, we ended up with a book 6 inches X 4 1/2 inches. Two sheets gave us 8 pages (or 16 pages if you count each side, back and front).

Use a hole punch to punch two holes in the fold of your book and thread with ribbon to hold the pages together. Use a bamboo skewer to push the ribbon end through the holes and tie the pages together with a bow.

I prepped the book beforehand, but in retrospect, it would be better to keep the pages loose. That way, if the child makes a mistake and wants to start over, it’s easy to toss the page and keep the rest.

Puzzle #1: Red and Blue Hidden Message

In this puzzle, the sentiment is written in blue, then scribbled over in red. You can only read the sentiment by hovering over it using a transparent red plastic object to see through the red scribbles. — **Write your message in blue, scribble in red, and decipher with a transparent red object**.

Write your message with a blue marker and scribble all over with a red marker. View the message with a strip of red cellophane, clear red building block such as MAGNA-TILES, clear red plastic folder, or even a red plastic pill bottle.

The deciphering object needs to be red and transparent. We made a viewer with a plastic square cut from a red pill bottle, encasing the plastic in a cardboard holder.

Puzzle #2: Invisible Ink Hidden Message

This message is written in lemon juice, which has disappeared upon drying. To read the message, dad needs to put the card next to a heat source, which will reveal the message. — **The lemon juice writing in the center of the page has disappeared. A heat source will bring back the message.**

Write your message using a q-tip dipped in lemon juice. It will become invisible when dry. To read, put the message next to a heat source like a candle (handled by dad; not the child) or an incandescent light bulb. Here’s the science behind this phenomenon. Miss T tried this one as a science project one summer.

Child squeezes lemon juice into a bowl. He'll use a q-tip dipped in the lemon juice to write his message. — **N squeezes lemon juice into a bowl to create invisible ink.**

Puzzle #3: Word Search

To create a word search puzzle, use a computer to make a table. Fill in the letters of the message vertically, horizontally, and diagonally. Fill with nonesense letters in the remaining blocks. — **Puzzle is ready to be glued to the page.**

Create a grid using your computer (insert table). We made our final puzzle 8 blocks wide and 10 blocks long. (Start with more blocks to get the boxes to the size you want, then delete the extra blocks.)

Fill in the child’s message in consecutive blocks–horizontally, vertically, and diagonally. In this case, “Takes me to football.” Print out a copy of the answers! Then, fill in all the remaining blocks with nonsense letters.

Puzzle #4: Mirror Image

A mirror is used to reveal the message, which is written backwards by writing on tissue paper, flipping the paper over, and tracing the message. — **Use a mirror to read the message.**

To write as a mirror image, write your message on tracing paper or any kind of see-through paper using a soft graphite pencil, such as a 2B sketching pencil. Flip the paper over (now your writing is backward) and position the message on your card.

Trace your writing with a regular pencil. The lines will transfer to your card. Go over the lines with a pen or pencil. To read the message, dad will need to view it in a mirror.

N used this technique before as an art tracing project during a session of Camp Grandma to improve his fine motor skills.

Child traces their tissue paper message onto the Father's Day card. — **N retraces the lines of his backward words onto his card.**

A Picture Page

For a simple, "free" page, cut out the child's photo and have them write a message. — **No puzzle on this page; just a photo and message.**

For a “free” page, we simply used a photo of N–an old photo that I had cut out for a project that never happened–and he wrote a message in a banner above it.

N’s own Creative Idea

I suggested to N that he write a clue on each page to give dad a hint for solving each message. N said he wanted to do it mostly in rhyme. So, here are some of his clues:

Mirror Image: “A looking glass is all you need, to pass this test with precision and speed.”
Red and Blue Hidden Message: “Use this hint to find the answer beyond the red tint.”
Invisible Ink Hidden Message: “Pourquoi Notre Dame était détruit.” (Why was Notre Dame destroyed–N goes to a bilingual French school but I don’t know if his grammar is correct.) The answer would be fire, which would be dad’s hint to seek out a flame.

DIY Father’s Day Card–Work in Progress

Our card is not complete. N still needs to write an introductory message to explain that this card is a book of puzzles and to write a “Happy Father’s Day” message inside. He’ll also want to draw more pictures and add another word game.

I’m thrilled that N rose to the challenge to invest more time, creating a significant keepsake Father’s Day card. Dad will love it!

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