My Mom's Beautiful Musical Chickadee's - D.I.Y.

Here you are ladies!  For those of you who wanted to know how to make the sweet little chickadees my Mom made.  My Mom has graciously come over to do a guest post here and show you how!  Let me introduce you to my Mom, "Ladies, this is my Mom, Linda Craig.  Mom, these are my lovely followers!"

Hello M'dears!  This is one of those projects I just knew would come out good IF I could only decide what I wanted and figure out how to produce it.  Months of cogitating on it, looking at Chickadees through the binoculars, and reading about them helped.  One thing I read was that we all call them "cute" because their heads are large in proportion to their bodies.  Anything with a large head we call "cute."  Like our children!  (Oh, thank you, Mom!)

You can also purchase these darling little birds from my Mom's new Etsy shop: HERE.

Materials List:
1 1/4 inch styrofoam balls
2 inch styrofoam eggs
sheet music, or 20 lb. cream regular paper
flat cream draft paint
black cardstock
flat black craft paint
rubber roller
sheet music stamp HERE
white school glue
hot melt glue gun
dull pairing knife
paintbrush
toothpicks
thin wood coffee stirrers
paper towels

Step One:
Study some pictures of chickadees, notice proportion and form of head, tail, and wings.  Don't skip this step!  It's fun and you'll be glad you did it later.  Keep thinking about how you want your bird to look as you make it. 

Step Two:
Slice off about about a penny size disk from the styrofoam ball.  Squirt hot melt glue onto flat spot of ball, quickly place on egg, where head should be.  Push together and hold while it melts togegther to form the shape you want.

Step Three:
Push a 1/2 toothpick in where the beak will be.  That will determine the position of the head.  Push coffee stirrer in for the tail support at the angle you want the tail.

Step Four:
Shake 1 cup water and 3/4 cup flour in a container.  Add 1/3 cup white school glue and 1/2 tsp salt.  Mix well.  (Amounts are approximate.  If too thin, add flour and shake.  If too thick add water and stir. The salt keeps the mixture from growing bacteria and mold.)  Tear small pieces of paper towel, dip in papermache mix, cover bird figure and form beak around toothpick.  Let dry thoroughly.  Mine took 24 hours on a grate by the wood stove.  If you don't dry them completely, they will mold.

 (tail and wing shapes shone)

Step Five:
Roll cream color paint on stamp and stamp black card stock.  Only about a third of my stamping came out thick enough but still defined enough to use, leaving quite a bit of waste.  Clean stamp quickly, paint drys fast.  Cut out tails, 2 per bird.  Tails of chickadees are about the same length as their bodies and quite narrow.  Glue one tail on top of tail support, the other underneath.

Step Six:
Print sheet music with lots of tiny notes.  Cut in small peices.  Use brush to cover back of piece with papermache mix and cover bird.

Steps Seven and Eight:
Cut out wings, glue on.  Paint beak, cap, bib, and carefully leave a small round glob of paint for each eye.  Later, when completely dry and hard, use a gold jell pen to draw a circle around each eye. 

Thank you Mom!!!  Now, if any of you lovely ladies would like to have a couple of these birds, but don't think you'd like to make them yourself, just fly on over to my Mom's Etsy shop,  Musical Motifs, and you can order them directly from her : )