Salaric

I made this pom pom Father Christmas in an effort to show my scouts what Christmassy things they could make with various craft bits and pieces.

I used: one large red pom pom, one slightly smaller pom pom, two small black pom poms, two small white pom poms, a tiny white pom pom and a medium white pom pom, a thick black pipe cleaner, medium thickness white pipe cleaner, one thin red pipe cleaner, a red metallic sparkly pipe cleaner and two self adhesive googly eyes. I also used PVA craft glue and a pair of scissors (as I chop the pipe cleaners with them, the scissors need to be sturdy and not be good dress-making scissors, as it will blunt them).

(in case you where wondering about the hand in amoungst the santa bits – that would be my two year old ‘helping’)

For his body I stuck the large red pom pom and the slightly smaller red pom pom together> I then stuck the medium white pom pom onto the slightly smaller red one as his head. I then made the mistake of gluing his arms on around the waistline (ie where the large red pompom and the slightly smaller one met).

I stuck the two goggly eyes onto the face and then cut a small 5mm length of the thin red pipe cleaner and curved it into a smile shape and stuck that onto Santa’s face. I left the whole lot to dry for a while. I then decided that he needed a black belt, so I cut a 10cm length of the thick black pipe cleaner and stuck it on around the join between the two red pompoms. This was when I discovered it had been a mistake to glue to hands on, as the belt needed to go underneath them. I had to thread it through and as a result, I don’t feel it was as neat as it could have been. That done, I thought that he was still missing something vital so cut a short piece of white pipe cleaner (approximatly 2.5cm) and stuck that down the centre of his chest as fur trimming of his coat.

For Santa’s hat I cut a third off a red sparkly pipe cleaner and twisted it into a conical spiral (a spiral that gets smaller as it goes up). I then cut a small hole in the tiny white pom pom, which I filled with PVA glue and stuck the end of the pipe cleaner in. I then left it to dry for a while.

I then glued the hat on Santa’s head. He looked almost right but he needed boots, so I glued on the two small black pom poms as feet.

I think this would have worked better with a larger range of pom poms, such as pink ones for the face and hands, meaning that I could have done white trimming on the hat and ‘sleeves’ of the coat.