What you make is a hanging shape. Four winter cut-outs print on one sheet, a snowman, a penguin, a bobble hat and a snowflake, each a single cut line with a small circle marked for the thread. Cut, pierce the circle, thread it and hang it, or glue it flat to a window or the front of a card.
What is on the sheet
At the setting the page opens on there are four shapes: a snowman about 75 by 108mm, a penguin at 75 by 99mm, a bobble hat at 76 by 77mm and a snowflake at 80 by 90mm. All four come off one piece of card.
Drop To a sheet to three and the snowflake goes, leaving the snowman, the penguin and the hat bigger. Put it up to six and you get all four plus a pair of mittens, one left and one right, so the sheet ends on a pair rather than on a second snowman.
The thread hole is marked, not cut
Each shape carries a small circle about 5mm across. Punch it with a hole punch or pierce it with a pencil point. Do not cut round it with scissors: a punched hole has a clean edge, and a cut one starts a tear that reaches the outside within a day of hanging.
On the snowflake the circle sits in the middle of the hub rather than out on an arm, because the hub is the only part of that shape with card all the way round it.
The name line
Inside has two settings. Blank leaves each shape empty. Name line prints a light rule across the broad part of it, which is what a decoration made by a class of thirty actually needs, and that rule is not a cut line.
The snowflake carries no rule at any setting. It is six arms off a hub and there is nowhere on it wide enough to write a name without the letters running off the end of an arm.
Card, and what to do with them
About 160gsm. Lighter than that and a hanging shape curls in a warm room and turns edge on, where nobody can see it. Two shapes glued back to back with the thread caught between them hangs straight and looks right from either side.
They work flat as well. Stuck to a window from the inside they read as silhouettes against the light, and on the front of a folded card a single shape does the whole job with nothing else added.
Questions
- What shapes are in the winter crafts set?
- A snowman, a penguin, a bobble hat and a snowflake at the four to a sheet setting. Three to a sheet drops the snowflake and prints the rest bigger; six adds a pair of mittens.
- How do I make the hanging hole?
- Punch or pierce the small circle printed on each shape rather than cutting round it with scissors. A punched hole has a clean edge that does not start a tear along the card.
- Can children write their names on these?
- Yes. Set Inside to Name line and a light rule prints across the broad part of each shape. It is not a cut line. The snowflake has no rule, because no part of it is wide enough.
- What card should I print on?
- About 160gsm. Thinner paper curls in a warm room and the shape turns edge on, and card also takes a thread without the hole stretching out of shape.
- Do these only work at Christmas?
- No. Every shape in the set is a winter subject rather than a Christmas one, so the sheet still makes sense in January and February once the Christmas decorations are down.