Much research on educational innovations treats them as purposeful endeavours, initiated with a clear goal for improvement of practice and eventually evaluating the fidelity of their implementation as well as effectiveness. However, innovative practices in schools can have many sources and their implementation often takes a surprising and unanticipated course. In this article, we present a case study reconstructing the dynamics of an innovation that was initiated by an individual Kindergarten teacher--the introduction of an educational artefact: the kamishibai--but eventually made its way into the school as a whole. Using interviews and observations, the study demonstrates the central role of interpretative negotiation in the implementation processes of educational innovations. It disentangles the interplay of individual and collective sense-making, characteristics of the innovative artefact as well as local policy decisions. The study reveals how the meaning and the possible use of educational artefacts change and develop over time in response to changes in the organisational context.