Queen's Guard soldier - 3D quilling

As you may know, I lived in Canada for a year, and this certainly influenced my creations. In Canada, you can see guard soldiers wearing a ceremonial red coat — a historic British military uniform, and a bearskin — a tall fur cap. That is because Canada is a federal parliamentary democracy and a constitutional monarchy at the same time, with Queen Elizabeth II as its head of state. Traditionally, the bearskin was the headgear of grenadiers, and is still worn by grenadier and guards regiments in various armies. The outfit is really hard to miss, and I was inspired by Queen's Guard soldiers when I made this three-dimensional quilled miniature wearing a bearskin.

Penguin Easter Egg - Quilling

On an Easter note, I would like to show another quilled egg I made recently. This is an emperor penguin. Emperor penguins are the tallest and heaviest of all living penguin species and are endemic to Antarctica. In my opinion they are the most beautiful, too. Males and females are similar in plumage and size, so my penguin may be either a mom or a dad, whichever you like better :) And there's a surprise, too.

Totoro Easter egg. Quilling

It's the end of March now, and with Easter around the corner — just the right time to begin making Easter eggs. Have you heard about a lost and found Faberge egg that was almost sold for scrap, by the way? Amazing story.

Quilled ornaments inside a glass ball

November is a good time to start thinking Christmas. I'm living in Canada now, and my neighbors have already decorated their houses. I thought it would be nice to showcase some Christmas ornaments with quilling today.

Paper quilling: Miniature squirrel

Do you remember my 3-D quilled family of mice? They have the cone shape in their base, with some traditional 2-D shapes used for other elements. The same technique can be used to make various characters, including animals, fairies, etc. For example, something like this small squirrel I created some time ago.

Quilled mask and hairpin for homemade costumes

This post is about this year's costumes I prepared for my girls. I know, it's too late for Purim and too early for Halloween, but I decided to show them now anyway. My elder daughter wanted to dress up as an owl, and I thought of the idea of a quilled mask right away. The mask is built on a cardboard base. First, I made the inner rim of the eyes using yellow and black strips 1/8 inches wide (about 3 mm). Then I cut wide brown and beige paper strips and used the fringed flowers technique to create the "feathers" around the eyes. When they were ready, I cut the rest of the brown and beige paper into 1/8"-wide strips (3 mm), used them to roll "eye" shapes, and glued the shapes onto the base, at the sides of the mask. The beak is made of plain and corrugated, 1/4"-wide (6 mm) brown strips. A brown skirt and a sweater with simple wings attached to the arms complete the costume.

Quilled dragon for kids

You are probably familiar with this quilled dragon I made with my children on last summer vacation. This is Toothless the Night Fury from "How to Train Your Dragon". My kids like the movie very much, so we decided to create together this lovely character. Quilling strips of black, bright-green and red colors were used for the project, all of them 1/8" wide (3 mm). We also used pieces of black paper for the wings. The wingspan of the dragon is about 4 3/8 inches (or 11 cm). Isn't he cute?

Quilled Totoro toy

If you haven't watched the anime film My Neighbor Totoro, I highly recommend it. This is one of my kids' favorites, so I made a tiny Totoro toy with paper quilling.

3D quilled princess reading a book

Let me introduce to you a new character in my collection of three-dimensional quilled miniatures. This is a princess in a fancy dress. It's hard to call this miniature a masterpiece, but my girls love playing with her, and this is most rewarding to me. The lower part is made up of two layers: the base is a quilled bell (beehive) of 1/8" strips decorated with "eyes" and tight coils; on top of it there's another layer, which consists of wheatear shapes created using 1/16"-wide paper strips. The crown is decorated with tiny rhinestones, as well as the pendant. The book is made of small colored paper sheets, about 3/16 x 3/16 inches each (5 x 5 mm). I decided not to create facial features this time. Height: approx. 3 inches (7.5 cm).

To learn the basics of three-dimensional quilling please download my step-by-step tutorial for making a 3D lion.

Happy New Year! Card with a quilled snowman

Wishing you a Happy New Year! I made this greeting card with a quilled snowman using blue card stock for the base, and white and light blue copy paper for the quilling and decoration. The tools used for this card include paper punches and patterned scissors.

Witch and wizard paper craft

Many of my readers celebrate Halloween, so I thought I'd post something related. Do you like these cute witch and wizard? They can be made out of paper withing a very short time. Actually, you can make any figure following the same principal: create a paper cone, cut out and attach arms and hands, then just decorate and add attributes and accessories. For the wizards it's a magical wizard hat and Turkish shoes, for the witch it's also a broomstick. Got it? Well, I'll try to make some order:

Birthday card with a quilled fairy and pergamano

Today is my elder daughter's birthday :) She's the best fan of my quilling, and naturally wanted to have a quilling card for her special day. As for the design, a fairy seemed a good choice for a girl's card to me.

Captain Hook's hook, recycling kids craft

Do you buy every toy you child wants to play with? Even if you know it won't last long? I don't think so. I'll show you how to make Captain Hook's hook in 5 minutes, if your kids are playing pirates.

1. You will need a disposable cup, preferably a paper one.
2. You will need also a piece of cardboard, for example a used box.
3. Fold the cardboard in two and cut a hook out of it.
4. Glue the two halves of the hook together, leaving approx. 2 cm (3/4 inch) unglued at its bottom end.
5. Fold those unglued ends outward, you will glue them to the cup later on.
6. Wrap the hook in aluminum kitchen foil and attach it to the cup, gluing the flaps you made in the previous step to its bottom.
7. Make holes in the cup for better ventilation. Let's play now!
8. You may also paint the cup according to your (i.e. your child's) taste.

Recycling craft: Robot made from boxes

We made this robot from various junk items: boxes, lids and bottle caps of different shape and size. All you need is to unfold the boxes, then fold them inside out and glue. Afterwards assemble the robot, paint it and attach bottle caps for eyes, ears, knobs and buttons. We also used drinking straws for the mouth. You can play with the robot or use it as a wall decoration, and even give it a hug if it's big enough :)

By the way, you must see the robots Gail from "That artist woman" made with her kids!

Red-haired fairy: 3D quilled doll

I keep exploring three-dimensional quilling, as you can see. When making this red haired fairy I tried to make it differently from many other quilled fairies (like in Three-Dimensional Quilling: Making Characters). First, her wings are shorter. I paid a price, though. Short wings do not support her, so I had to glue her onto a matchbox to keep her upright.

I also made her a magic wand out of a paper rectangle and a bead. Folded a tiny rose and put it into the fairy's hair. For the face I cut out paper eyelashes and mouth, and painted the eyes using felt-tip pens.

That's it. She is about 8 cm high, by the way.

My first three-dimensional quilling: Lady in blue.

Kids' craft: Gnomes made out of sticks

I found this idea at one of my favourite crafts blogs. Gail of "That artist woman" explains how to make gnomes out of sticks. Each of our family members made a gnome of their own. We used colored paper for hats and shredded paper for beards.

Lady in blue, 3D quilling doll

About a week ago I received the book Three-Dimensional Quilling: Making Characters from Amazon. And couldn't help making my first doll. Nothing special, exactly by the book.

For the dress I used hand-coloured with sparkling watercolour paper. The skirt requires three strips 1 cm wide, the top — two strips, the sleeves — one strip 0.5 cm wide for each sleeve. The rest is made of regular 3 mm strips I cut myself. The hair is made of narrow strips cut along in three, after gluing. That is, you get three hairs 1 mm wide out of a 3 mm strip. And finally, used fibre-tip pens to draw the facial features.

Homemade rag/cloth doll

It was hard to resist the temptation to sew a rag doll (there are so many fabulous examples out there!). Especially when the younger daughter wants badly a doll she saw in her sister's kindergarten... She loves her new doll, fortunately.

I used fabric scraps, kitchen clothes and yellow yarn for hair. How to make it see this and this articles at eHow, for example. Google can be even better.

Balloon face kids' craft

One of five-minute craft projects for kids— a balloon face. The idea isn't new, I saw similar projects on many sites on the Web, you can even buy a craft kit for it.

Inflate a balloon and draw a funny face on it using permanent markers. Cut out cardboard feet and decorate them. Attach the balloon to the cardboard using an adhesive tape. The feet should be big enough to hold the balloon steadily. Have you balloon wear a funny hat: a ribbon, a paper top hat, or a cap. Ours was wearing a doll's hood, but the doll asked it back right before the picture was taken :)

Kids' collage with symmetrical silhouettes

Cutting out symmetrical silhouettes looks to me like a magic. You fold a piece of paper, cut something that looks like nothing, open it and...