Backer Exclusive- Easter Egg Paper Child (Patreon)

Printing Instructions:

Toner/Copier Printer:

If Using Markers:

Cardstock or Bristol Paper should work well.  Otherwise, you should be good to go- Copics were designed to render over toner without reactivating it, and most modern alcohol markers follow Copic's lead!

If Using Watercolor:

80 lb (student grade) watercolor paper should work just fine with a copier.  If you'd like to use a heavier paper, you may need to go to a copy place, or work with a larger format printer that allows for flat lay printing.

Note:  If printing on watercolor paper at a copy place, if they're having trouble printing on it, suggest the set the paper color to Ivory- the sensors seem to pick that up better.

Inkjet/Watersoluble Printer:

If using Markers:

Cardstock or Bristol should work well.  You should be good to go, alcohol markers tend not to reactivate inkjet ink, as they use different solvents.  If using WATERBASED markers, see if using watercolor below.

If Using Watercolor:

Water will reactivate the lineart, causing it to bleed.  This includes waterbased markers.  You can try adjusting the opacity to the lightest you can see or use my blueline printing technique and pencil  or pencil then ink on it before coloring.

IF printing the color illustration, I recommend printing it using a toner printer if possible onto heavier paper such as cardstock or bristol.  If that is not available, I would recommend printing it 2x, glueing or taping the two together (either before or after cutting, depending on how you're cutting it), and going from there.

If you want to do this with a young child, I recommend:

Let them color it

You cut it out (or they can cut the larger sections)

Assemble together! 

Materials You'll Need:

Either your lineart or pre-colored Kara paperchild, printed ideally at 9x12 if you can, or scaled to 8.5"x11" if you cannot.  I recommend you don't resize to fill the page, because we use the paperscraps for this project.  If you do wish to make her larger, just keep in mind that you'll need additional paper.

Scissors

Cutting blades if you wish

Double stick tape

Single Sided Tape

Paper Scraps

Egg (I recommend plastic)

Pipecleaners

Popsicle sticks

Scrap heavyweight paper

Coins

Masking Tape

Foam tape

Note:  Most of the materials can be found in the craft section of Dollar Tree.  I purchased my pipe cleaners at Walmart-  most of these materials can be found there as well!  You CAN use glue, but it may cause warping and will also require dry time.  I find a combo of double stick and single sided tape works really well for my paperchild designs, with the added bonus of immediate gratification! 

Painting:

Video: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/xi5grQXVrzIAs with my other paperchild designs, I sketched this design on Canson XL watercolor paper, inked with a Sakura Pigma FB brushpen, and painted it with the QOR mini palette, with a ceramic plate for mixing and round watercolor brushes. After inking, I allowed the inks to cure for a day before erasing and painting.  I taped my inked illustration to a piece of chipboard using artist masking tape.  After painting, I allowed the illustration to dry out overnight before removing from the chipboard.

If you're painting along and would like to paint Kara the same way, I used:

Very watered-down burnt sienna for her skintone

I applied a light wash of Ultramarine Blue to the yellow areas first to create shadow

I mixed the cool yellow with Indian yellow for this mid-tone yellow 

For the purple, I mixed magenta and ultramarine blue, and as I needed a more saturated purple, I added in a little of the dioxine purple.  

Kara's hair started out with burnt sienna, but as I needed to add darker lowlights and shadows, I mixed in some of the darker brown (it's either sepia or burnt umber, I apologize that I can't remember).  

Freckles were added in burnt sienna

blush was added with alizarin crimson.

Cutting Instructions:

Video: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/piY6NW_U7Gk

I am TERRIBLE at cutting, and the materials I'm to cut using are pretty awful too.  I would really recommend sharp-tipped precision scissors, rather than scissors from when I was legit in middle school.

Cut out all the large sections first.  I like to cut off the excess paper on the sides in long strips and set those aside, those will be useful for creating the base.  I also cut off the large triangular sections and set those aside.

Once the bulk of the paper has been removed, I use my exacto blade to fussy cut small areas like around her pigtails, or the corner in her arms- anywhere it would be challenging to get scissors into.  If you're comfortable using a blade, you can use one for the whole thing if you want, but I find it really makes my arthritis flare up, so as soon as I fussy cut out those small areas, I pull out the scissors.

I cut the arms off from the body, and save trimming those for later, focusing on trimming the body.

I apologize that I don't have photos for this- I do have video, but it's difficult to take photos while you're cutting.

I recommend testing out the arms- I realized that I made her back arm a little too long, so I marked it off and trimmed it.  I apologize that this didn't make it into the final design.

Assembly Instructions:

Video: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/5VvM9jPtPAk

Select your pipe cleaner, find the midpoint, and tape it to the back of the paperdoll.  I'm using double stick tape first to place it, then taping it down further with single sided tape.

I double stick taped a piece of watercolor paper cut to the shape of Kara's torso on top of the pipe cleaner, and taped half a popsicle stick on top of that, to give her torso some structure.

Since she's going to be holding a 3D egg, I need to build the arm up quite a bit.  I use the foam tape stacked on top of itself to build up the arm area, running it along side the pipecleaner. 

I also go ahead and use double stick tape to tape down the pipe cleaner going down the length of the arm that's going to be behind the egg.

I apply double-stick tape to the top part of Kara's arm, and stick it to the pipe cleaner, kinda adhering it to the foam tape at the top as well.  You may want to bend the arm bits a little bit to give them some curve so they can better hold the egg.

I attach the lower arm, leaving a small amount of pipe cleaner uncovered to allow for flexibility in the joint.  I also tape the other hand.  I found that I needed more pipe cleaner to really hold the egg, so I cut off a small additional length and twisted it into my existing pipe cleaner.

I join the pipe cleaner from the other side of Kara's arm to this piece of pipe cleaner, creating a loop.

Testing with egg and making slight adjustments.  In this photo, you can see the pipe cleaner at the elbow.

And in this photo, you can see how I built up the arm that goes around the egg using the pipe cleaner and foam tape.

Building the stand:

Using the long rectangular scraps of watercolor (I used 2) make a large triangle base. I like to have some overlap for rigidity, and I double stick tape the paper to itself.

Since Kara will be supporting her own weight, and the weight of the egg, I want to reinforce weak points and joins, like her feet.  I use long scraps of watercolor paper to build up her legs, double stick taping them to one another.  I also use a torso shaped scrap to add reinforcement at her hips.

I apply double stick tape to the back of Kara's feet, and adhere her to the base.

Because I have to overengineer everything, I also cut a popsicle stick in half, trim it down to the size of her legs, and tape that as well.  These go on the other side of the base, and provide additional support.

If things seem to be coming loose, use your single-sided tape to just really tape it up.  If your kids like wasting tape (or if you like wasting tape, like I do), this is a great activity for them.  I use the cheap single sided tape from Dollar Tree, but Scotch would look nicer.

Using a large triangular scrap of watercolor paper, I create a base for my base.

And to provide counterbalance to all that tape (and the egg) I create a little weight parcel out of coins.  Any small weight would probably work, you could probably just glue down a pebble.

I wrapped it in masking tape to kinda hide Kara's cash stash, and tape it to the base using double stick tape.

Slot in your egg (this one has a nifty little bow on it) and hey, you're basically done!

This papercraft could be an exciting way to add a little magic to an Easter Egg hunt, a fun way to wind down after a long day of eating Easter candy, or a cute way to display a particularly precious egg.  If you want to use this to display wooden eggs, I recommend adding more weight to the back.  The base can easily be hidden by real or faux flowers.

Originally I'd designed her to hold one of my handpainted eggs, but there was a whole lot of finagling and finessing NOT shown in the videos or here. In the process of figuring out how I wanted her to hold the egg, I realized those eggs are kinda fragile (a friend's kid already broke one by dropping one last year) and the watercolor might smear with too much handling.