Creativity 521 #62 - My little fairy {Giveaway of The Cardboard Box Book}

The girls have been sharing this pair of fairy wings for some time and I thought "Wouldn't it be cool if we had one more pair of beautiful wings?" As usual, buying one just didn't seem as appealing as making one, so we decided to see if we could gather materials in our house to create a pair of wings.

So, in today's Creativity 521, I'm sharing about how we made our first pair of DIY Fairy Wings and the good thing is we had all these stuff lying around at home so we didn't have to spend a single cent! Yippee!

I will also be sharing with you about this awesome craft book, The Cardboard Box Book, which will teach you and your child how to transform cardboard into imaginative creations. If you are keen to try it out, I am giving away two copies at the end of the post, so read on!

What we used:

1) The Cardboard Box Book as our guide
2) Empty box
3) Pink spray paint
4) Glue 
5) Sticky tape
6) White glossy paper
7) Pink polka dotted scrapbook paper
8) Small piece of red paper
9) Scissors
10) Pencil
11) Ribbon
12) Decorative butterflies/Gem stickers /Beads/Other embellishments of your choice

Although the book suggested using a cereal box for this, we really preferred a bigger pair of wings so I used a large empty cardboard box instead. Firstly, I drew a wing shape on one side of the box. cut it out and flipped it over to use as a template for the other wing. You will need to fold the adjoining portion into half when doing this.

This is how the cut-out should look like when the excess is removed.

Since I used a bigger box, that meant that my middle portion was wider and so to make it more narrow, I folded both sides in as shown and used sticky tape to secure.

Next, I used the spray paint which was left over from making our DIY Piggybanks - also made out of recycled materials. To make the colour more even and cover up the design on the box, I coated with three layers, leaving a 10-min interval each time to allow the paint to dry. Remember to spray on both sides so that the wings look pink from both front and back.

While waiting for the paint to dry, I worked on the wing segments based on the instructions in the book. For this, I drew out the shapes and curves freehand on glossy photo paper and cut them out accordingly. To make sure the left and right segments are of the same size, I used one side as a template for the other by flipping it over to trace.

Glue the wing segments onto the pink wings as shown once it is completely dry.

After that, I used a big tin lid to trace a circle on the pink scrapbooking paper and cut it out.

I made a flower pattern using a small jar lid to trace and cut out five white circles and a red circle for the middle. Arrange and glue them onto the big circle. Next, stick two lengths of ribbon onto the middle portion of the wings and then glue the circle on top.

Lastly, use embellishments of your choice to decorate the wings and ta-dah, we are all done!!

Here's my little fairy who was really thrilled to put on her pair of pretty pink wings!

You know, we have been reading The Hungry Caterpillar recently and she really loves the part where the caterpillar transforms into a beautiful butterfly and will go ecstatic by pointing to it and screaming "Ah-fly! Ah-fly!" So, it came natural to her to pretend to be a butterfly and flutter round the garden with her newfound wings, taking time to smell each and every flower along the way.

Fairy wings or butterfly wings, I can't really tell but as long as she is happy, that is what makes me happy too.

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Now, for those of you who are keen on crafting and have some cardboard lying around in the house, check out how you can turn them into fantastic creations together with your child!

Inside The Cardboard Box Book, you will meet Boxy who will be your friendly guide and will provide you with tips and tricks to help you get creative.

The contents page gives you a glance of what you can make and this includes a total of 17 fun and creative projects.

There is also a list of the special equipment which helps you to get prepared in advance. Do remember that in crafting, you can be flexible and even if you do not own a particular piece of equipment, you can always come up with alternatives based on what is available.

At the end of the book, you can also find more than 10 templates in an envelope which will help you to make and decorate some of your projects.

This is the fairy wings project which we did and I found that the instructions were straightforward and fairly simple to follow. I love the clear and concise illustrations which help to make things easy to comprehend. In fact, older children will likely be able to follow the step-by-step guide and come up with their own creations in some of the easier projects.

Now, just to let you have a better idea of what the book encompasses, I will showcase pages of some of my favourite projects which look really fun to make!

1) Gingerbread House

2) Cake Stand

3) Play Oven

4) Market Stall

5) Mini Theatre

6) Princess Castle

7) Mailbox

8) Train

9) Cardboard City

Now, are you tempted to get your hands started on one of these too?

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Good news! A Happy Mum is now giving away two copies of The Cardboard Box Book to those readers who are keen.

To participate, leave a comment in this blog post with your name, email address and tell me which is your favourite project from those I have mentioned. Indicate in the Rafflecopter widget that you have done so and to increase your chances of winning, you can choose to carry out the rest of the options. Best of luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway Disclosure: We received a copy of The Cardboard Box Book from Pansing for review purpose. Giveaway copies are also kindly provided by Pansing. All opinions are our own.

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To fellow bloggers who have a fun craft session, DIY tip or creative idea to share, come join in the party! Highlight and press Ctrl + C to copy my button above, include it in your post/sidebar and add your link below. I will be hosting Creativity 521 on the 5th and 21st of every month, do hop over for more inspiration. Remember: The sky's the limit when it comes to creativity!