Plain piñatas? Pah!!!

Yesterday the kids and I started making piñatas.  I managed somehow to delude myself that I'd get away with letting the kids just stick a mish-mash of different coloured tissue paper on them then add some tissue paper tails and they'd be overjoyed with an octopus each.  Oh no, of course not.....  The girl wants a piggie and the boy a dinosaur.  I thought it would only be polite to make a red Angry Bird for my niece.

With nothing fancier than a piece of thin card, a pencil, a pair of scissors and some masking tape, I was determined to turn the drab papier-mâché balloons into a work of art

I sketched out some dinosaur spikes, a pair of piggie ears, a head and a tail feather for the Angry Bird and a semi-circle which I taped into a cone shape for its beak.  Rather than cutting the shapes out exactly, I cut an extra 1.5 cm on the edge that was to be attached to the balloon.  I then cut tabs and folded them in alternating directions (except for the beak, for which I folded all of the tabs outwards).  I also made a papier-mâché piggie snout which I shaped around a little freezer weaning pot covered with cling film (I was hoping to use a section of egg box but they don't seem as cup-shaped as they were when I was a lass).

I taped the adornments in place with the masking tape.  When taping things to the top of the balloon, I would highly recommend bending them so the contact point to the balloon is curved, otherwise (for example the head feather) they will be floppy and won't stand up.

I then tore up some more old magazines and  mixed up some more paste using 1 part flour and 2 parts cold water and covered the features and masking tape with more papier-mâché.

The kids are eagerly waiting for them to dry so they can paint them with water-based paint =)