When my six-year-old niece saw the sequin snowman ornament I made for my Christmas tree this year, she was fascinated. I told her that when her Mommy and I were little girls, we loved it when our mother (her grandmother) would give us a bowl of sequins, some pins, and a Styrofoam ball to play with. Sure, it kept us out of Mom’s hair so she could get an hour’s peace, but we thought it was the finest of activities!
After hearing this story and seeing the snowman, Squirt insisted on making something similar for herself. I was happy to oblige, of course. Since Christmas is now over, an ornament wouldn’t do, so we decided instead to make a disco ball she could hang from her ceiling.
I already showed you the basic technique in my snowman ornament tutorial, but Squirt wanted me to take pictures of her doing this craft, so I’m going to go through it again for ya.
To start off, you need sequins. Lots and lots of sequins! You can use any color or size you like, but make sure they are nice and shiny so that they reflect light well later.
You’ll also need gobs of straight pins (one per sequin) with a tiny ball head. Look for something labeled as silk pins. Finally, you need a Styrofoam ball in any size you like. We used one that was 6″ in diameter.
As Squirt illustrates so well, you start by taking a pin and putting it through the hole on a sequin.
Then you push it into the Styrofoam and press it all the way down with your thumb.
Squirt loved this craft and did a great job at putting the sequins on.
We had to work on it in two different sessions because her finger got sore from pushing the pins, but eventually we had a really awesome and sparkly disco ball.
After she took it home, she attached a ribbon to the top and hung it from her ceiling, by the light. It gives off lots of pretty little sparkles that she loves!
4 comments so far:
This is a fantastic idea! Now I know what to do for an activity for my daughter’s birthday party! Or maybe for the loot bags! How do you secure the ribbon ona 6′ ball?
Heather, sounds like a fun activity for a party! If you have the girls do this activity during the party, I would suggest using small balls, maybe 3″, so that they have time to finish and don’t lose interest. We used hot glue and a couple of pins to attach the ribbon to the ball.
I tried this with the silk pins – and with sequin pins – and the sequins fell off! SO, I made one with Beading Pins – PERFECT!! – and then used seadbeads on applique pins!! Turned out SUPER-CUTE!! My Girl Scout Troop had a BLAST making them! Thank you for the idea!
Audra, funny that you mention using sequin pins, because we recently discovered and tried those and had the same results you did — they are so short that they fell right out of the Styrofoam. Thanks so much for sharing your tip about using beading pins and seed beads. We’ll have to try that out!