How to make pinwheels

Since I'm now working full time it's really cutting into my crafting and blogging time. So I thought I'd pull something that I did in the summer and didn't post - plus with this beautiful spring weather we've been having I thought it would be cute. (I started writing this when the weather was still warm - today it was snowing a bit so I guess spring isn't quite here yet.)

At the end of the summer last year I made these for decorations for a weekend bbq. The kids thought they were fun even if the wind just turned the pencils in the vases verses actually spinning the pinwheels.

I got the tutorial on ohdeedoh. Look there for the full tutorial - I'll just brief over what I did. First do not to use heavy weight scrapbooking paper - I had this pretty heavier paper that was printed on both sides but it didn't want to bend very well for this project. I used plain scrapbooking paper cut into 5"x5" squares. Then folded in half in a triangle and then folded the other way and cut up the fold line half way. I found it easiest to pre-prick the holes on the tips so it went together easier. I used pins from the dollar store (that aren't good for anything else) and cut them down to about 1/2" or maybe less. I pulled the 4 corners together with the pin and through the centre and then I used a small seed bead as a spacer before I stuck the pin into the eraser of the pencil. The spacer just helps it to spin. I also put a dab of glue on the end of the pin in hopes that they would stay in place. They didn't stay together but I think they held up a bit longer because of this.

I had a bunch of coloured pencils - which actually say "Vone's pencil HANDS OFF!!!" on them from my sister-in-law that I used. She got them for me because I complained that I could never find anything with my name on it as a child so that Christmas I got 3-4 things with my name on them.

I put them in Vodka shot glasses. I don't think we've ever used them for vodka and they are pretty big for a regular shot so they've mostly been used for small flowers and decorations.

Pinwheels would be fun to make with the kids for the windy spring weather.