Can I print one to fold?

Yes. The Print tab builds a PDF of the fold template with your fortunes, your numbers and your colour names on it, with dashed fold lines and the four folding steps printed under the square. It is built in your browser, so nothing you wrote is sent anywhere.

Cut out the square and lay it face down. Fold each corner into the middle, turn it over, and fold each corner into the middle again. Fold the whole thing in half, then slide a thumb and a finger of each hand under the four flaps. It opens one way, then the other.

Can I write my own fortunes?

Write eight and the catcher uses only yours. Write fewer and the rest are filled from the set you picked, so you can replace the two that matter without writing six more.

Is the grown-ups set rude?

No. It is office-party level: nothing sexual, no alcohol or drugs, nothing dangerous. It is behind a tap so that a classroom does not find it by accident, and a share link never opens on it.

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Fortune teller

Pick a colour, count it out, pick a number, lift the flap. Then print your own to fold.

Pick a colour

colour · number · number

Which fortunes

Grown-ups: office-party level, never rude

Or write all eight yourself

Write eight and the catcher uses only yours. Write fewer and the rest come from the set above. They stay in this browser.

The counting is the game

A cootie catcher is not a random number generator with extra steps. The colour you pick is spelled out one letter at a time, and the catcher opens the other way on each letter, so a three letter colour and a six letter colour leave you looking at two completely different sets of numbers. Then you count your number out, which moves it again.

That is why children argue about which colour to pick. It genuinely matters, in the sense that it genuinely changes which four flaps you can reach, and this page does the same thing rather than shuffling behind your back. Rename the colours and the paths change with them.

Playground rules, which nobody agrees on

Some tables count the letters of the colour, some count to the number twice, some lift the flap on the first number rather than the second. None of them is wrong. This one uses the most common version: spell the colour, count the first number, lift the flap on the second, and the printed template says the same on the back.

If your version differs, play yours with the printed one. The paper does not mind, and the fortunes are the same either way.

Writing eight fortunes for a class

Eight is a good number for this because it is small enough to write in one sitting and large enough that a group of six will not all get the same one. Keep them short and keep them kind: a fortune teller passed around a table is read out loud, and a line that lands badly lands in front of everybody.

For a classroom, fortunes that are small instructions work better than predictions: swap seats with somebody, ask a question you have been sitting on, explain the last answer out loud. For a party, the ball is the shorter version of the same idea, and the envelopes give a group the same moment of reveal without anybody folding anything.

Nothing to install, nothing to sign up for

The tool runs entirely in your browser. There is no account, nothing you make is uploaded, and nothing you type is sent anywhere or put into a link.

The page itself is not silent, though: it carries advertising code and a visit counter that sets no cookie, and the cookie page says exactly what each of those does.

This page remembers your settings in your browser under pph.fortune.bank, pph.fortune.custom, pph.fortune.colours and pph.fortune.paper, and nowhere else. Clearing your site data for papercarnival.com removes it.

Questions

Can I print one to fold?: Yes. The Print tab builds a PDF of the fold template with your fortunes, your numbers and your colour names on it, with dashed fold lines and the four folding steps printed under the square. It is built in your browser, so nothing you wrote is sent anywhere.
How do I fold it?: Cut out the square and lay it face down. Fold each corner into the middle, turn it over, and fold each corner into the middle again. Fold the whole thing in half, then slide a thumb and a finger of each hand under the four flaps. It opens one way, then the other.
Can I write my own fortunes?: Write eight and the catcher uses only yours. Write fewer and the rest are filled from the set you picked, so you can replace the two that matter without writing six more.
Is the grown-ups set rude?: No. It is office-party level: nothing sexual, no alcohol or drugs, nothing dangerous. It is behind a tap so that a classroom does not find it by accident, and a share link never opens on it.

Fortune teller

The counting is the game

Playground rules, which nobody agrees on

Writing eight fortunes for a class

Nothing to install, nothing to sign up for

Questions

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