Stamping Fun !

Stamping

            Dear friends this is just another fun post to share my little girl's stamping. You will be wondering "Oh so Dr Sonia is teaching her daughter to stamp?!" Well.....its the other way round... I have a somewhat cowardly bad habit of not wanting to try something unless I know " all about it !!" [Anyone there with the same traits....?] My daughter on the other hand has to play with a new craft supply the moment we get it!!

Stamping Fun

This stamped musical show is my 8 year old's work...her sketch pens acted crazy according to her so the smearing in parts [ She has not yet heard of copics so I am saved for now!!]

Stamping Fun

Here is a photo to make you smile!! How many of us look so happy with our crafty projects!!

PS : my dashboard has been acting real crazy and so I 'm having difficulty in catching up with blogs---I'm able to drop by friends who leave comments.I hope blogger acts better real soon!!

Please do leave some encouragement for my little girl
Edited : This stamped project got honorable mention at Creative Moments animal theme challenge

Panda Paintings

Dear friends in my last post on Panda bear foam craft I mentioned how fascinating I find Panda Bears..I was delighted that many of you share my love for Pandas.

Panda Watercolor Painting

Sharing 2 paintings of Pandas done quite some time back[before my little one was born !]This one is a watercolor painting done using instructions from a book[sorry cant remember the title]

Panda Watercolor Painting

The interesting forest background texture was achieved by painting with salt! 

Panda Glass Painting

The mamma -baby Panda pair is a glass painting ...such a soothing medium to work with.Design is a freebie from the net [lost the links as this was again done years back ]

Please do forgive the "amateur" standard of the paintings...I have no formal art  training and these were just experimental fun projects ! 

Panda Craft Tutorial

Panda Bear Crafts

Panda bears are so fascinating and we keep making all kinds of Panda bear crafts at home.Sharing how we made an easy "Panda on a Bamboo" Penstand. This one is  probably one of my all time favorite kids craft project because it was so quick and easy .

Panda Bear Crafts

Materials Required

Anything cylindrical  to recycle:Tin can , glass jar,  tissue roll,Cardboard container etc.We recycled a tin can to make  our penstand.

To make the Bamboo : Use any green/ yellowish green material to line your cylinder-Card stock / Foam / Felt or even cloth. We used foam...I find its easier to maintain when you have a forever dust accumulating roadside house!

To make the Panda:Card stock / Foam / Felt.We used foam...its a fantastic medium to use when crafting with kids as you can wipe off finger stains,glue stains,food stains and whatever else little fingers will contribute !
To cut :Scissors /Punches/Dies - Simply hand cutting would be the fun and easy way to make this project but since I have a die cutting machine I used dies to cut out oval and circular shapes to make our Panda. I let my little one decide the shapes and sizes of the body parts.

Adhesive:This is the most important factor to make a quick , easy and mess free foam craft project! You can use anything which little hands can peel off easily such as double sided foam tape,double sided adhesive tape [my favorite as its adhesive properties are much better than the foam tape] or glue drops

Panda Bear Crafts

We lined the the edges of the green foam with double sided adhesive tape [bought locally] and stuck it on the tin.I also stuck a strip of  the  double sided adhesive tape on the inner top edge of the tin and folded down the foam as shown to give a neater edge to our Bamboo penstand !

Recycling Crafts

We roughly played with our cut circles and ovals.Do ignore our scallop edges....[I only had scallop dies and not the regular circle and ovals!] My daughter complained our Panda looked like a flower!

Panda Bear Crafts

My little one assembled the face using glue drops [ glue drops are a lifesaver when crafting with kids! Nowadays they are available in rolls too which makes it even easier for little ones!].Our Panda's ears and snout are scallop circles and the black eye is actually a flower !! Proper circles and ovals would be a better choice to make a Panda !

Panda Bear Crafts

To raise the snout we layered 2 white circles on Panda's face.

Panda Bear Crafts

We wanted to raise the body off the Bamboo stand so we used sticky foam tape on the circular black body of our Panda foam craft.

Panda Bear Crafts

We used ovals for the arms and legs of our foam craft Panda.

Panda Bear Crafts

Our Panda looked glum without a smile!

Panda Bear Crafts

So my little one added a rosy red tongue and a paper umbrella.

Panda Bear Crafts

We had also made some Panda pencil toppers in a similar way using smaller parts but I think the dog ate it![Just joking...its lost somewhere in our super messy house!]

Here are links to some more Panda bear crafts

Panda Bear shaker,slider cum Pop up card 

Panda Bear Interactive Card

Panda Bear Pop up card tutorial
I hope you enjoyed this easy foam craft..do share your comments.
Supplies: Foam,Big shot[Die cutting machine],Dies:Couture creations Scallop circle,Sizzix Oval scallop,Googly eyes, Paper Umbrella -Raja Market

Quilled Teddy Bear Pop up Card

Quilled Teddy Bear Card

This card is one of my first quilling cards made some months back-- been too embarrassed to post this due to the imperfect quilling but today I needed a birthday card for a 6 year old boy- Didnt have anything boyish so attempted to dress the quilled teddy bear  up a bit by adding the thermocol fence and some green grass to make it look better!This was one of the first quilled balloons I made and ahem that is not too  bad I guess!

Quilled Wiper Card

One thing I do like about the card is the fun pop up interactive element. On pulling one side of the card the Panda magically pops up. This is called a wiper card.Maybe the little boy wont mind my imperfect coils and like the surprise pop up panda bear and googly eyes!

Quilled Teddy Bear Card

This is the closeup of the quilled Teddy bear with googly eyes. So not a " wow" creation [In fact I almost cringe seeing the way the coils look!] but thought I would nevertheless share a " so so creation!" Do be kind!

As usual a couple of recycled elements in this one too:

The blue borders- not pretty store bought paper but cut from the edges of a magazine!

The fence- Hand carved from a Thermocol tray

The jewelry box picture- cut from a jewelry advertisement in a magazine!

Flower stem- Handcut from a magazine cover

Pop up Card tutorial - Make any Picture into a Pop Up Card

Pop Up Card Tutorial

In this tutorial I will share how to make a quick Pop up card using any picture.This card is for my daughters friend who is learning Karate.I already had a card made some time back with an interactive Panda  jiggling around on the front of the card and I needed to quickly make the inside of the card.

Kinetic Card Tutorial

On pulling the tab the panda slides and jiggles around.

Kinetic Card Tutorial

Kids love anything that moves on a card .The kinetic mechanism is fairly simple and here is the interactive mechanism hidden behind the corrugated green card. The panda and the pull tab are connected with a split pin[shown as red dot].Next time I make this type of mechanism will take step wise photos and post a detailed tutorial.

Pop Up Card Tutorial

For the inside of the card I made a quick and simple picture pop up card.This is the most common type of pop up mechanism you will find in childrens' pop up books and its amazingly simple to make once you get a knack of the pop up mechanism.
How to make a picture Pop up card.
What you need to make this type of Pop up card

• Picture on thick paper more than 140 g
• Scale: to measure and make horizontal lines
• Cutting mat or your kitchen cutting board[what I used till I got a cutting mat]
• Xacto knife or surgical blade which ever is available to you

Choose a picture [should not be very thin paper something around 140 g or more is ok].I have used Kungfu Panda wallpapers on A4 sized Photo-paper.
Score the central crease partial length only- as shown by the red line. You can use a pen whose ink has run out to score the lines.I stopped the score line at the mountain as I am going to pop the panda at the mountain.

Pop Up Card Tutorial

Decide at what distance you want your picture to pop out from the background. I made our Panda pop out at 1 cm.So here measuring 1 cm and drawing horizontal creases at 1cm distance.

Pop Up Card Tutorial

Cut the outline of your picture.On this photo you can see the horizontal creases at 1cm distance.Next use your knife and cut the side outlines of the panda to the bottom.

Pop Up Card Tutorial

Mark your lower crease.The Panda outline needs to be cut till the lower crease which will be at 1 cm distance from the central crease of your card.I have used a 1 cm pop up distance , you can choose whatever takes your fancy depending on your image.It should just be the same at top and bottom[ shown in blue].

Pop Up Card Tutorial

Fold at your creases as shown and your picture is now a pop up card![Folds are valley fold,mountain fold and again valley fold as shown].

Pop Up Card Tutorial

I made a step on the lower half of the card also pop up by the same mechanism.
Stick your pop up card picture on the card base making sure not to get any glue on the popping up parts and your card is complete.Have fun!

Photo Pop up Slider Card

Photo slider card

The photo pops up to show the greeting

Photo pop up slider card- well that is exactly what it is.The photo pops up by a slider mechanism to reveal the sentiment in the handmade greeting card.We made this for my my cousin who is a favorite with my daughter!

Kicking Panda and Quilled flowers atop the Slider Card

Slider Card Side view

This was such a super fun and easy card to do. Here is the tutorial for the pop up slider card

Kinetic Card- Moving Panda Quilled Card

Kinetic Card- Moving Panda

This is a Card I designed myself. My daughter is a big fan of Kungfu panda .On pulling the green Lever the Panda jumps and jiggles this is by means of a right angle lever mechanism using a hidden metallic brad mechanism at the junction of the panda piece and the Horizontal piece. I loved making the quilled embellishments for this card.

Jungle Diorama

Jungle Diorama

My little one has various theme weeks in school and she loves to take something from home to "show off" It can be a chart or some pictures. Recently her theme in school was wild animals and we went all out and made a jungle diorama from an old cardboard box. A window was cut on the front of the cardboard box to make this jungle diorama. The background has pleated shiny paper stuck on it to create the jungle diorama scene.

Jungle Diorama

We did a bit of recycling too.. since the animal pictures are mostly stickers or cut out from books we first stuck them on stiffer paper cut out from magazine covers.

Jungle Diorama

The Panda is sitting on a hanging cardboard bamboo cut out from an old cereal box.Our jungle diorama was a fun and easy project to make and my little one was so proud to take it to school.

Pop Up card, Slider card cum shaker card

Pop Up Card Panda

This is an all in one card!  A penny slider card with a pop up card of a sitting Panda and shaker card all in one birthday card for my 3 year old daughter's friend's Birthday.

Shaker Card

I handcut the arched door and added a shaker atop a photo of the 2 friends.Used a lady bird to make the slider card.

Slider Card Shaker Card

Hand cut a circle and used a sliding doll to make a slider card.

Slider card front

I used a  Panda bear graphics [ from a site whose link I have lost] to make the Panda pop up  card.

Pop up card Panda Card