Panda-fy your Paper Lantern / Bubble

Obsessively watching baby panda videos on Youtube turned out not to be a complete waste of time after all. For one, it deepened my love for white fluffy things, like the "It's so fluffy, I'm gonna die" unicorn, samoyeds, and this extreme samoyed. Did I mention samoyeds? And that is always a wonderful thing. Then, there's the inspiration that a white Bubble is almost a panda face, without the black blobs.

And there's the recognition that adding black blobs to a white Bubble is certainly one of the very few ways I'll ever have a panda. 

I proceeded to make two ~3" black pompoms (how-to video here) and strung them together with twine. Tying and hanging them from the vertical ribbon created those Mickey-Mouse ears, and I adjusted their locations by lengthening or shortening the connecting twine. 

Then I cut out three black blobs to be the eye patches and nose, which were attached to the Bubble with glue dots. You can probably also use poster tacks. 

Download the eye patches and nose template here and make your own paper pandas! 

You can use any paper lantern like the ones shown below. The template and pompom size work with lanterns ~10" in diameter. To fit a smaller or bigger lantern, simply scale up or down accordingly. Have fun! 

Left / Right

EXCLUSIVE Video!

Here is the behind-the-scenes look at how the Bubble is made, hand-crafted from start to finish! Doesn't it look like I am playing some sort of musical instrument?

My FIRST attempt at making videos

OK, I am just going to admit this. Ever since moving back to Vancouver, I have been increasingly obsessed with Youtube. In the beginning, it was just some random video clips here and there, to satisfy my need for some images that move (no cable TV in this house!) But like Alice in Wonderland, I followed one adorable puppy to the next laughing baby down that rabbit hole. Now, not only do I have an endless subscription list, I found myself also making assembly videos for my products... 

Assembly Guide for Bubble (no bottom opening) UPDATED

Assembly Guide for Bubble Lamp Shade (with bottom opening)

And I had a blast learning to shoot and edit these videos - that iMovie sure came in handy. I definitely plan to make DIY tutorial videos for the paper bracelet and bowtie. Please let me know if you have other ideas and stay tuned!

PS. Currently, I am watching: Vsauce, Sonia's Travels, Daily Grace, Wong Fu Productions, Andrew Jenks, and it goes on and on.

Happy Long Weekend!

I don't always celebrate Easter, but when I do...

Bubble Engineering, Continued

I have been taking woodworking class at a local community center. Four weeks in, and I am 2/3 way to finishing my first ever (tiny) bench. This class makes me realize just how heavy "real" wood feels, and to NEVER again complain about how IKEA furniture is difficult to assemble. I thank you, IKEA! But most importantly, I love all the different, handmade jigs available to help you perform specific tasks more efficiently and accurately on the machines. Totally inspired: with simple material from Home Depot, I devised and hand made a jig to help me score crease lines. Oh, and I also laser-cut a special scoring guide for my Bubbles. Mmm... Laser! High tech meets low tech.