Eat Chocolate, Drink Coffee. English Paper Piece the Trash into Holiday Decor

It is not an exaggeration to say that English Paper Piecing (EPP) is one of the most addictive quilt-related activities I've ever undertaken. It wasn't enough for me to do EPP with fabric, first to make quilts, and then to stitch polyhedra.

But then, a couple of years ago, after my DH caved to supermarket displays (always blame the DH!) and bought a bag of Lindt Truffles (no financial affiliation!) I found myself fascinated by the wrappers.  One thing led to another...at parties, I started following people around to collect their wrappers....and here are tutorials for two projects made from them. Both are sparkly, fun, and therefore perfect holiday decor!  These truffles come in so many colors, you can do Christmas, Chanukah, Kwanza color schemes, and more! 

PROJECT 1 Small Pentagon Bowl

Detailed directions are in my polyhedron book, but you can don't need it to follow this tutorial. You will need a regular pentagon shape. 

1. Cut out six cardstock pentagons. Mine are 1.75" high, from the middle of the base to the tip, a good size for this particular chocolate brand.

2. I'll break it to you gently: You must eat six chocolates: One for the base, five for the sides. It's your creative duty. (OK, you can share the burden with someone you love.) I was at Costco yesterday and one of the generous ladies was handing everybody 3 Lindt truffles! Pass her twice! 

3. Wrap each cardstock pentagon with a candy wrapper.

As you fold to the back, figure out where you can trim away extra.

Cut same-size pieces from more foil - I used a holiday coffee pouch and glue-sticked the pentagons to the backs. They don't wrap around.

Lay everything out. 

Zigzag the pieces together on the sewing machine. As my book explains in detail, I first go around the central piece,  attaching the sides; then sew up the seams between all side pieces. I used silver metallic thread in the top.... 

...and the bottom....

I put the inside of the foil coffee bag on the outside, on one panel. I think it creates a sort of spaceship effect. 

Wasn't that fun? If you're still have leftover wrappers, you can make....

BOWL II: Hand-sewn Hexagon & Pentagon Bowl

This bowl's a little bigger. This time, you have to drink a lot of coffee as well as consuming six chocolate truffles
The first step is to cut six cardstock pentagons, same size as the project above, 1.75" in height. Wrap each with a truffle wrapper. 

The back. Cut away excess. 

Instead of covering each of the backs with another foil piece,  I tried mashing down some of the backs neatly. (Don't iron, for gosh sakes, the wrapper will melt and attack you with toxic fumes!) Then I stitched a star in silver metallic thread, from the front, to hold everything down.

The smushed backs looked pretty good! 

For the center, you need a hexagon whose sides are the same length as the pentagon's sides, 1.25" in this case. Cut it from cardstock. 

I wrapped one side with a coffee bag piece cut a little larger than the hexagon, so I could bring the edges to the reverse side. 

And in the opening, I slid another coffee bag piece the same size as the hexagon. 

Laid out the pentagon pieces around the hexagon base, good side up. 

Unthread the sewing machine. Use an old needle. Set the machine for a long stitch, even a basting stitch. Send the central piece through the sewing machine, poking more-or-less equidistant holes all the way around. Do the same with the side pieces. 

Hand lace everything together with sturdy thread. I used upholstery thread. 

Hand stitching is a bit awkward. I tried lots of different stitches to see what I liked best. They all worked fine, a whipstitch, a lacing stitch, whatever you like. 

And it's done!

Backside. 

Side view.

But wait! There's more! More chocolate wrapper - and broccoli bag - projects are posted  here. My favorite of all is this hand and machine sewn dish on that page and in the photo below.  

It cuts the sweetness with nutritional information! The base and square pieces are from the bag that holds the candies. The shape is a partial truncated cuboctahedron, and it's another project from my polyhedron book, available on etsy, here, for immediate digital download, or in paperback from Amazon, here. 

Hanukah Gift Ideas: Paper and Fabric Judaica to Make, Sell, or Fling

Is it a bird? Well, birds are involved....

Is it a plane? No, more like a Frisbee - if you fling it, it flies, but not well enough for a game of  Frisbee golf. Wait, I remember! It's one of the yarmulkes (little Jewish hats) I brought to last week's artisan fair at my nearest synagogue, Pasadena Jewish Temple and Center!

I rarely do fairs - it's nearly impossible for a fiber artist to charge enough for the hours we put in. Nobody wants to pay $60 for a potholder. But someone I adore asked me -  and here she is, Ellen Dinerman, my son's kindergarten teacher (two decades ago), and an accomplished artist who makes extraordinary sculptural jewelry (sold here. No financial affiliation!)

I hoped the event would be a good opportunity to downsize my stash of Judaica seeking forever homes. My table:

Closeup of the top matzoh cover:

Underneath were more matzoh covers. Some, like this one, can do double duty....

If you don't want to use it as a matzoh cover, you can stuff an 11" pillow form into the back...

(The fun fabric above, featuring Maneschewitz wine and other Passover props is sold at 1-800-dreidel.com. They also sell the trompe l'oeil matzoh fabric.) My pile also included challah (bread) covers and mats, like this one, stitched from kaleidoscopically pieced fabric....

....and miscellaneous fiber art, like this wall hanging (now in my Etsy shop.) The Hebrew letters spell "Chai" for "Life!"

 Yarmulke section:

I make them from whatever fabric is feeling spiritual to me - starting at 12 o'clock and moving clockwise in the photo above, there's Mighty Mouse and Hebrew alphabet hats; a Harry Potter Bukharan style kippah; Pikachu; a hat pieced made from necktie fabrics; chile pepper fabric,  and way in the back, chess fabric. Closer:

The perfect kippah for a bishop! For shoppers who look at my hats and say, "Ha! I could make those myself," I heartily agree, and point to strategically-placed copies of my yarmulke-making book (which I sell online in paperback and digital form.)

Ellen gave me a second table for a craft activity with the Sunday school kids.

The supplies are for making paper hats that can also do double-duty - turned over they make festive candy dishes, and if you fling them with a twist, they can fly much better than the fabric version - comparable to a decent paper airplane. Patterns for these hats are in my OTHER yarmulke-making book, "Yarmulke-gami: E-Z Paper Fold Jewish Art Hats."  

I brought a stack of hat patterns for kids to cut out and decorate, printed onto cardstock. 

I made the patterns in my graphics program.  The round hat folding pattern has the Temple's sisterhood logo in the middle. Underneath the hat pattern is a pyramid-folding pattern.

I made about 60 copies of this page. I also showed off a row of samples.

Closer: One of them is a sponge-painted hat, folded into what I call a "Simple Star."

Here's another sponge-painted hat, this one folded in my "Dimple Star" design. Can you see the difference? This star is rotated so it's points don't line up with the darts. 

This basic hat is made from an acrylic painting on a piece of cardstock. 

The next is napkin decoupage. 

Here's my 'Diamond Star' folding pattern, made from textured scrapbooking cardstock.

Below left is a hat made from a map, and on the right, one from a scientific paper. The latter is colored and folded into my "Chickens Over Mt. Sinai" design. (also looks like a hamantaschen.) I twirled a decorative rose from the same paper.

This page was from a wildlife charity catalog.

I channeled my inner third grader to make a sample for the day's project. (The sequins were a test of whether a temporary glue stick holds them well. It doesn't.) 

Along with glue sticks, I provided the kids with lots of multicolored paper, stickers, markers, crayons, and Chanukah paper with dreidels and stars. (No sequins.)

The most popular supply turned out to be these: 

And here's a terrific hat made by a 6th grader who used them well! 

Plus several kids made pyramid gift boxes from my folding pattern.  Here's one I made as a sample:  

Good for holding gelt. Or, they serve as handle-free dreidels - put a Hebrew letter on each side, then toss it in the air. Of course, this being a tetrahedron - aka a "triangular pyramid" - when it lands, you have to wonder - which letter wins?  Three of the four sides are up! Maybe the one facing down at the table? This particular pyramid was folded from a foil coffee bag, with stamped Hebrew letters glued to each side. (I LOVE polyhedra!)

And here's a pyramid made and decorated at the fair by an authentic 6th grader.

Of course, with the pyramid theme, they may fit in better for Passover. My original idea involved covering the outside with brick fabric, and putting a frog inside:

But back to the present(s). I gave each kid three chocolate kisses to insert before sealing the last fold.  I didn't think of bringing candy until the morning of the event - and then, the only kisses I could find at the drugstore were packaged for Christmas, in red and green as well as silver foil. So we all had a good laugh about that. I wished I'd thought this through earlier, in time to buy chocolate coins to put inside. 

Thank you, Ellen, for inviting me to this fun event! I downsized my Judaica stash a bit, and had a blast shmoozing with other artists, shoppers, and creative kids!

P.S. I just saw the following fabulous wrapping paper at my local independent bookstore - Vromans in Pasadena. Wouldn't this make great paper kippot?