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On Thursday afternoon I went to Nature in Art for another of their Dare to Dabble sessions. This time the craft was quilling, which, for those of you who haven't heard of it, involves making pictures with curled strips of coloured paper.

It turns out the basics are quite easy, and once we'd had a bit of practice we were able to make cards by putting together the different colours and shapes. It's quite absorbing and making a card takes time because each quill has to be made separately.

It has a similar appeal to me as cross stitch does and it something I could certainly see myself doing more of at some point. A basic quilling tool (for curling the paper) and papers aren't expensive and it seems a good way of making handmade cards. As with most things the more complicated the work, the more expensive the tools etc.

The Christmas card I made, with a close up showing the individual strips:

Crossposts: https://thesmallhobbit.livejournal.com/296378.html

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

angelofthenorth

I remember quill ing being a big thing in the eighties

From:

smallhobbit

I have a feeling I may have tried it then, but without a quilling tool - it was much harder. This is fun.

From:

badly_knitted

So cute! Never tried quilling myself.

From:

smallhobbit

Thank you. I think you might like it.

From:

stonepicnicking_okapi

Interesting! New to me but looks fun!

From:

smallhobbit

It is fun. I suspect it gets more complicated, but for basic cards etc it's fun.

From:

moth2fic

I've done quite a lot of quilling - both for myself for card making, and as a classroom craft. Not sure whether it might be suitable for Brownies. One way of creating the strips without hassle is to use those paper shredding machines - the hand operated ones are good, and are cheap. You can vary the colours and themes and produce things like Christmas trees or Easter flower scenes. Glad you enjoyed it! I haven't done any recently because there's a sort of limit on how many quilled cards you can send your nearest and dearest.

From:

smallhobbit

I can see that the number of cards would be limited, but it would be fun for a couple of years.

I wondered about quilling with the Brownies. Done in small groups it should work. I won't say 'what could possibly go wrong' because we are talking Brownies, but it's something I will bear in mind.

From:

moth2fic

I got some absolutely fabulous results from Y6 (primary) but didn't do much with younger ones which is why I'm saying I'm not sure. I think from a time point of view you might need to provide ready cut strips, especially for 7-year-olds. Then if it works you could spend another session explaining the easiest way to create the strips at home.

From:

smallhobbit

I can imagine some of our oldest Brownies would produce some good pictures. We'd use ready cut strips - we've learnt to prepare as much as possible in advance. And then there's the concept of 'use a very little glue' which doesn't always compute! It's certainly something to keep in mind when we're looking for a different craft to do.

From:

moth2fic

I think 'use very little glue' can be counterproductive for quilling. Some children take the admonition very seriously and then, of course, the quills don't stick, or only stick temporarily. A word of warning. I recently found a sample card I'd made about ten years ago - half the quills had fallen off. So don't try to produce heirlooms!

From:

badly_knitted

I think you're right, but how do you stick the thin paper edges down so they stay put? That's what's always baffled me...

From:

smallhobbit

Once you've made your paper shape you use a little PVA glue to stick the end in place, holding it until it's stuck. (Too much glue and you stick the shape to your fingers - yes, I was channelling my inner Brownie!) Then you glue the shape to the card, again a little glue in a line across the circle so the centre doesn't unwind any further.