holiday – Geek Crafts

Make Your Own Giant Origami Bunnies!

Since Easter is right around the corner, I thought I’d share this cool tutorial from Amy on Oh Happy Day so you too can populate your space with giant origami bunnies! Because who doesn’t need one or two (or twenty) giant origami bunnies, right?! The tutorial has lots of pictures and even a short video for one of the more complex steps, and it all seems easy(ish) enough to follow. Some pretty expensive paper is getting used for the bunnies shown (something like $40/roll–yikes!). I haven’t tried this, but I think if you’d be willing to go with a less giant bunny, instead of using 53″ square piece of paper (as called for in the tutorial), you could probably get away a 24″ square piece of poster board for around $1. Furthermore, if you were a super creative type, I don’t see why this concept of giant origami couldn’t translate to other cool shapes (if somebody makes a giant Yoda origami, you MUST share your creation!).

Make Your Own BB-8 Glitter Globe!

This is definitely the droid you’ve been looking for. Kelly Knox over at Geek and Sundry has a delightful little tutorial on making your own BB-8 Glitter Globe, and it’s the perfect DIY holiday gift (plus it’ll give you something to do while waiting with baited breath for the movie to finally open)! The tutorial includes pictures and detailed instructions for making your own cute little droid. A few clever modifications, and you could probably make this glitter globe into a cute ornament too. Be sure to share pictures of your glitter-tastic creations!

Happy (Almost) Thanksgiving!

With Thanksgiving soon here, I thought I’d take to Etsy to look for some fun holiday-themed jewelry with everyone.

First up, this cute pair of pumpkin pie stud earrings. They are made by Zebranas in Haarlem, The Netherlands, and sell for $12.04 per pair. Made out of Fimo silver plating, the earrings are 20 mm x 8 mm.

Next up are these Butterball turkey earrings, perfect for the hostess with the mostess! This offering comes from Rubiotomus in southern California. They are made of surgical steel kidney ear wires, polymer clay and silver plated french hook ear wires, and sell for $16 per pair. The turkey itself measures 3/4″ long.

But if you get earrings, don’t you really need a nice ring to go with them? GiraffesKiss of Torquay, England might have the ring you need then: a roast turkey ring, with cranberries, carrots and peas. Made of polymer clay, this ring comes shipped in a tiny roasting pan, for the finishing touch.

But if funny clay food jewelry just isn’t your thing, then this necklace might be more up your alley: a Thanksgiving pumpkin snowglobe on a chain from Priyasha from Santa Cruz, CA. This adorable and sparkly pumpkin snowglobe necklace is filled with a tiny blown glass pumpkin and gorgeous glitter fall leaves in beautiful autumn colors. The glass snowglobe pendant includes a 20″ gold plated chain with a large lobster claw clasp for quick fastening/unfastening, and it’s available for just $27.

Wrapping Up with Geeky DIY Gift Wrap Ideas

Let’s pretend you’ve got all your shopping done for Christmas. Now what? If you’re like me (well, if you’re like me you don’t have any shopping done, but like I said, let’s pretend) if you’re like me, you suck at wrapping gifts. Even if your wrapped gifts end up looking like a two-year-old went crazy with a roll of scotch tape, the paper itself can look really cool, and you can make it yourself! What’s even better is that these wrapping paper ideas work for year round, not just the holidays.

If the force is strong with this one present, then you should try Rebecca’s Star Wars silhouette gift tags and wrap idea from her blog Older and Wiser. All you need is a printer, scissors, and a glue stick.

If you’re pressed for time, the Harry Potter fans in your life will get a kick out of this free printable owl post gift wrap paper. Just download and print it out on some craft paper. You can thank Chiara from Celeste Fritatta for this one.

This one is my favorite, and it’s so easy. All you need are some crayons and a piece of decorative wash tape and you’ve got interactive wrapping paper. Rachel on Lines Across has got even more super easy and fun interactive gift wrap ideas like this one you should definitely check out.

Get Your Last-Minute Geek On with Christmas Printables

The countdown to Christmas is down to single digits now – are you ready? I still have some wrapping to do, so of course I turned to the Internets for some ideas. And they did not disappoint. Here are several options for adding some geek flair to your gift wrapping.

First up is a series of Doctor Who-inspired printable holiday cards (like the one pictured above) by Natalie Shaw at Doodlecraft. (You may remember her Doctor Who Holiday Countdown I recently linked to.) Well, she has even more Doctor Who craft ideas up her sleeve! She created A2 card size (1/4 of a sheet) images featuring Daleks, Judoon, Weeping Angels, the Silence, and Cybermen. Hey, even villains celebrate holidays!

Next up, Ellie Petrov designed some Minecraft gift tags and graciously shared them. She offers a PDF of Minecraft Santa tags, and one of Minecraft snowmen.

Liz over at Being Geek Chic also has some Doctor Who-inspired printable wrapping options – both gift tags and wrapping paper.

Have you found any other geeky wrapping options? How are you planning to add geek flair to your holidays?

Links of Interest:

Printable Doctor Who-inspired holiday cards at Doodlecraft
Printable Minecraft gift tags by Ellie Petrov
Printable Doctor Who gift tags from Being Geek Chic
Printable Doctor Who wrapping paper from Being Geek Chic
More Christmas crafts on GeekCrafts
More papercrafts on GeekCrafts

Gingerbread Optimus Prime!

This is the gingerbread Optimus Prime made by a friend of a friend of Redditor downvotedagain. Caroline Eriksson, the girl in the photo, made our favorite Autobot, and said it’s only made of gingerbread and melted sugar to hold it together.

Tag: holiday