apply a faux metal finish to an egg

Brief Description: High school kids might enjoy this egg decorating project. It is certainly a bit more complicated than most Easter egg crafts. However, if you enjoy this one, you may like to try even more of my egg decorating crafts here.

My egg sample showing a faux metal finish technique.

Supply List:

• a plastic egg
• aluminum foil (The type you buy at a grocery store)
• black acrylic paint
• white glue
• puff paint (any color)
• masking tape
• Mod Podge 
• soft cloth or tissue

Directions:

1. First cover the surface of the entire plastic egg with masking tape until none of the surface is left bare.
2. Use you puff paint to draw a swirl pattern around the entire egg. Let parts of the design dry as you proceed. 
3. Once you are finished and the surface is completely dry, this could take some time, apply the white glue to areas of the egg while applying the aluminum foil. Take care not to rip the foil and do not layer more than one sheet. 
4. Use your finger tips to press the foil down into the surfaces of your design over and over until you are satisfied with the overall effect. 
5. Now let the egg dry completely and then brush a watery layer of black acrylic paint onto the egg's surface.
6. Wipe away the paint with a soft cloth or tissue so that the raised areas made by the puff paints are shinier than the crevices of the design. Let the egg dry.
7. Apply Mod Podge to the finished surface when done.

 An alternative faux metal technique from Aleene.

glue together a shell mosaic box

I chose to make this box to hold a gift of pens and brushes for one of my adult children this year.

Brief Description: Although this craft is simple in its application, the design work used in such a project may be very complex. The key here is to work slow if you should choose to use a cardboard box to decorate instead of a wooden one. Otherwise, the walls of the box could warp while your work is drying. 

Supply List:

• wood glue
• a bag of tiny stones
• shells
• a sturdy box with a lid 

Directions:

1. Lay out your mosaic supplies and determine the pattern that you would like to use in the creation of your decorative gift box.
2. I chose to arrange these tiny shells in a simple floral design. I used wood glue to adhere the shells first to the surface of my box lid. Then I let this dry overnight.
3. Then I carefully applied the wood glue to small areas of the lid and covered these with my tiny stones. These areas were approximately two inches in diameter. Let each area dry completely before proceeding to the next application of stones. Again, this will help prevent the surface of your lid from warping.

A few close shots of the surface of my gift box: left, is a side view, right, a top view of the floral shell pattern.

Watch a CraftKlatch sea shell coaster craft.

See also the stone resin coaster by the same crafter.

handcraft your own artisan pizza

  I saved a real pizza box to store my pretend pizzas in.

Brief Description: These little pizzas are made entirely of paper. I made these samples for a child's kitchen playset. However, teachers may prefer to make larger versions for a fun classroom craft.

Six steps for making an artsy pizza.

Supply List:

• sturdy paper plates
• newsprint
• brown paper bag
• masking tape
• white school glue
• red and brown acrylic paint
• soft, small paint brush
• papier-mâché pulp
• shredded yellow papers 
• Mod Podge

Directions:

1. Crush a long narrow strip of newsprint to form the edges of your pizza using masking tape to attach it to the outer rim of your stiff paper plate. Mask the entire plate with the tape.
2. Cover the plate with white school glue and shredded brown paper sack paper. Cover the top layer of the paper with the same glue and let the pizza shape dray overnight. 
3. Prep the papier-mâché pulp according to the directions found on the package. Ad a very then layer of this to the top of your pizza's surface only. 
4. If you choose to make a sausage pizza, at this point you would need to make the surface of the pizza a bit lumpy with the papier-mâché pulp. Let the pizzas dry after this step. You may need to set them in the sunlight or near a warm air vent to speed up the drying time. Do not put them near an open flame! It may take a couple of days for the pulp to dry depending on the time of year or the climate in your environment.
5. After your pizzas have hardened, you may paint the "saucy" papier-mâché area with a tomato red acrylic paint and if you have a sausage pizza, use a brown acrylic paint to color the raised areas of pulp brown. I cleaned up the edges of the sauce a bit by adding more glue and brown paper where I didn't want the red paint. Let this dry; it shouldn't take long.
6. Drizzle the white glue on the top parts of the pizza where you would like to add cheese. I shredded several yellow papers in advance for this part of the craft. I used acid free papers because I wanted the colors of the cheese not to fade over time. You may use whatever paper you have at hand. Sprinkle the paper on top of the glue and add more layers of glue as you go. Finish the entire surface of the paper pizzas with Mod Podge at the end and let this dry. 

Here you can see up close the difference between the tomato sauce and the sausage on the surface of the pizzas.

Additional Suggestions: Try to shape all kids of veggies for you pizza with papier-mâché pulp and cut paper.

A great Pop Art pizza project.

• The cutest felt pizza toy ever!
• Cardboard pizza oven craft  
• Pizzah Rat

shape a dozen papier-mâché doughnuts

Finished papier-mâché doughnuts. Some young person will enjoy playing with these.

Brief Description: There are many people both young and old, who enjoy crafting fauve foods. Every students can learn to craft papier-mâché doughnuts with just a few inexpensive supplies. Many crafters will probably have the majority of these supplies already in their possession. 

       Crafted foods make unique little gifts for the young child who loves to play house or who likes to pretend to sell things in a play marketplace. Once you get the hang of sculpting these baked goods, try shaping even more of your favorite foods. Before you know it, you'll have a whole kitchen full of these low fat, delicious, baked goods to share with friends and family!

Supply List:

• brown paper bag
• newsprint
• masking tape
• papier-mâché pulp
• white school glue
• acrylic paints
• seed beeds
• transparent glitter
• soft, tiny paint brush
• tin container and plastic lid (cleaned and recycled)
• Modge Podge
  

Directions:

1. Crush newsprint into long cylindrical shapes.
2. Shape these into round refined doughnuts and then wrap the surfaces completely with masking tape.  (shown below)
3. Apply white glue to the surface of the masked confections with your fingers and apply shredded brown paper on these surfaces.
4. Let everything dry overnight. 
5. Prepare the papier-mâché pulp as the instructions on the package state. Now apply a bit of the papier-mâché to the top of each doughnut till these look frosted.
6. Let the donuts dry overnight again. 
7. Paint the papier-mâché different colors with the acrylic paints; let this paint dry.
8. Apply white glue or a tacky glue of some kind on top of the papier-mâché icing and sprinkle glitter or seed beads into the paste. Let it dry solid
9. Apply a generous amount of Modge Podge to seal the doughnuts.
10. After these dry, display them in a clean, dry recycled container. They make the perfect craft for little ones that like to play house!

Additional Suggestions: Your teens will love making papier-mâché food crafts giant sized. Hang these from the ceiling during a Pop Art unit/lesson.

These papier-mâché doughnuts are ready to ice and decorate.

Left, masked papier-mâché shapes. Right, papier-mâché
shapes covered with a layer of brown paper.

Larger papier-mâché doughnut pop art by the Electronic art room.

All instructions and photographs, templates are copyrighted by Grimm 2017