November ATCs - Paper Folding

"Paper folding" was the theme for one of my ATC swap groups this month.  As soon as I knew the theme I was sure I would do some sort of origami.  When I was in elementary school I did a report on origami and made a big board full of folded creations!  I was fascinated by all thing things you could do just starting with a square of paper.

One of my favorite things to fold was this little pagoda shape.  I won't put the step by step directions here right now (I didn't take photos along the way) but if you are interested leave a comment and I will try to create some simple instructions (or maybe a short video would be easier).

There are 14 people in the group - that is a lot of pagodas since there are three in each stack! The paper is cut to 2 3/4, 2 1/4 and 1 3/4 inch squares.  Folding the pagodas from the 1 3/4 inch squares was very tricky for my adult hands to do ( I remember it was so easy when I was 10 years old!).

At first I tried using some scrapbook paper but it was too thick for the tiny shapes with so many folds.  The paper should also be two sided or solid due to the nature of the folds.  I found some origami paper that I bought years ago when we lived in Germany and chose three "Autumn" colors.  After they were all folded (which took much longer than I had planned on - thank goodness for Priority Mail) the sections stack together.

The bottom tier of the pagoda had a tendency to pop open so I put a glue dot in each side to keep it flatter.

I started making the pagodas before I got the Pagoda cartridge.  Once I saw this branch, I knew it would make a perfect background for my little pagoda. (This is the same branch I used for the Christmas wreath - here is a LINK to the wreath post).

I used some "sand" paper from an old DCWV Summer cardstock stack for the card base.  I inked the edges just a bit for some definition.

I usually do the backs of the ATCs on my computer.  This month I kept it very plain and chose the "Matisse" font which somehow looked Japanese to me (!)

I think we all had fun with this theme - the ATCs look great and I can't wait until they arrive in the mail.  I took a sneak peek at them on KER's blog - she is our hostess and does a great job of getting everything in and out each month.  Thanks to all of the great people in this group we have had very punctual and exciting swaps each month for nearly two years now.

Here is a LINK to KER's blog where you can see all of the other ATCs from our group - enjoy them!