You know the feeling. It's Christmas Day, the crackers have gone with a bang, and your inner magpie wants to take possession of every gaudy plastic toy and cheap magic trick on the table. A part of you wants to treasure them forever, but when dinner is over, you find you're tired of fiddling with the cracker prizes and sweep them all into the bin with the uneaten sprouts.
Not this year.
Because we're going to show you how to turn your cracker prizes into jewellery.
We've got a series of craft posts lined up for you over the holidays, where we'll be turning the tat from our crackers (above) into one-of-a-kind accessories. We'll be using techniques from our book,
How To Make Jewellery with Tatty Devine, and equipment from our
tool kits.
First up is an easy-peasy one.
How to make a Giant Paperclip Brooch
You'll need:
Glue (we like Araldite but you could use superglue, contact adhesive or a glue gun)
Rough sandpaper
Used cracker
Cocktail stick
Brooch back
Before you start, decide where you want the brooch back to go. It's a good idea to stick it towards the top of your trinket, so it will nestle nicely against your jumper without sagging.
Use the sandpaper to roughen up the area where you're going to glue on your brooch back. This will help it stick.
If you're using Araldite, mix it up on a bit of used cracker card using a cocktail stick.
Slather the glue generously to the reverse of the brooch back with the cocktail stick and then stick the brooch back to the reverse of the plastic paperclip.
Leave it to dry.
Pin it on and reward yourself with some 'stationery' time on the sofa watching a festive film.
P.S. We got a tape measure in our crackers, so look out for one in yours and turn it into a brooch or a Christmas tree decoration. There are instructions
over on the Boden blog for making our Tape Measure Rosette.
