Pokeball Xmas Tree Decoration

My latest creation is a rather small and simple one (and again I apologise for reminding people that Christmas is all too soon again on its way – and a secondary apology as it won’t be my last Christmas themed project for the year…) 

Materials

Styrofoam ball

Red & white paint

Black marker

Paint brushes/water/newspaper so as not to get paint everwhere..

Pin

Ribbon

Craft glue

Pen

Milk bottle lid

STEP 1

Draw the middle circle part of the pokeball on your Styrofoam ball.

STEP 2

Paint the top red half of your ball. It doesn’t have to be perfect as you will draw a line around the middle of the ball later. However, make sure not to go too much into the white bit as it’s hard to paint white over colour. I think I did two layers of red paint, waiting for it to dry in between coasts.

TIP: I rested the ball in the lid of a milk bottle to hold it still whilst it was drying.

STEP 3

Paint the bottom half of the ball in white. The balls come white anyway, but I thought it gave it a smoother and nicer effect when painted. When dry repeat.

TIP: when washing out paint brushes put a bit of soap or dishwashing liquid in your hand and swirl the brush around in that – it’s really good at helping to get more of the paint out.

STEP 4

Using the black marker, draw around the centre of the ball and around the circle in the middle again.

STEP 5

Cut a piece of ribbon about 15cm long. Fold it over itself at the ends and put the pin through it. Put a bit of craft glue on the end of the pin then push in to the top of the ball.

Now you have a pokeball decoration for your Christmas tree!

I plan on making more with glitter and other colours and hanging then on my geeky Christmas tree

Deck the halls… with Pokeballs! Christmas Cards

Yes, it’s that time of year again… The time when the shops start preparing for Christmas ALREADY and people who work in retail start preparing themselves for ‘the nutty’ season.

So, although I’m not quite ready for Christmas yet (didn’t we just have it a few months ago??) I’ve decided to try and approach it with a positive outlook and get into the Christmas spirit (slowly), with the help of some Christmas themed crafts.

Today’s (well yesterday’s) creation is a Pokemon themed Christmas card! (Turns out Christmas can be fun!) 🙂

It’s pretty simple to make, and you can have lots of fun coming up with different layouts. Here’s one that I designed.

Materials:

• Paper – green, red, white and black
• Card (or can use card/scrapbooking paper and make your own) + you probably want an envelope
• Gluestick
• Scissors or paper cutter (if you have a circle cutter that would make it look so much better!)
• Pen
• Some circular things to trace (if you’re not using a circle paper cutter)

 

STEP 1

Get your card and add a background if you wish.

STEP 2

Find something circular to trace around and then cut it out – this is the black layer and should be the largest – you will need three (I just used the lid of a hair spray can).

STEP 3

Then you want to find something that’s a little bit smaller to trace around (I used a shot glass) and trace and cut out two white and two red circles. You will only need two for each of these as you will cut them in half. After cutting them in half you will want to cut a little bit more off of them (so theres the black gap in the middle).

STEP 4

Find two things even smaller to cut around (I used the top of the gluestick). These will be the black and white middle circles. Cut them out.

STEP 5

Arrange your pokeballs so you’re happy with sizes, how they look etc. then glue them all together.

STEP 6

Draw some holly and cut it out.

STEP 7

Arrange the holly and pokeballs on your card. When you’re happy with the layout glue them on!
And that’s it! All done! (TIP: remember to check (before gluing) that you’re gluing them down the right way on the card, so it opens the right way. I may have gotten a bit over excited and forgot to check and now the way you’re meant to hold it, it kind opens forward towards the holder… Still not really sure how I managed to get that so wrong and not check it… Of course, if you’re a bit ditzy like myself, you can always just the other half of the card off and turn it in to a postcard!)

 SPREAD THE CHRISTMAS CHEER & ENJOY!