Mosaics

Snip 'n Stick

Paper squares snipped from the ends of strips of colored paper encourage imaginative mosaic patterns.  The possibilities are endless.  You just need lots of colored paper and glue.

You’ll need:

Plenty of colored paper strips: Cut strips from construction paper, magazine pages, wrapping paper, wallpaper, old calendars, cards or any paper with interesting color or texture. Make them 1/2 - 1 inch wide, depending on your project.

Base paper: A sturdy base paper is easier to glue shapes onto.  For variety, cut your base paper into a shape ahead of time depending on your  theme or season (fish, turtle, bird, leaf, house...)  Kids like contrasts - they enjoy gluing bright shapes on black or dark purple paper.

Glue or paste: Elmer’s glue, School paste, or a paste mixture of flour and water. Glue bottles work well. But you can also put a small amount of glue into a lid or onto a piece of wax paper and apply it with the finger, a Q-tip, a brush, or narrow cardboard strip.

Here’s how:

• Cut paper strips ahead of time on the paper cutter or with scissors.
• Snip square shapes from the ends of the paper strips. Choose color or colors according to a theme, or for a random pattern.
• It works best to apply glue to the backing paper and then lay the paper shapes onto the glue.  See
  gluing methods described above.
• Keep adding dots of glue and laying on additional squares until you are happy with the mosaic. Paper squares can be quite widely spaced, overlapped or completely covered over the whole shape.

Possibilities:

• Line shapes up in a row to make a snake or a worm, a train or a road.
• Stack some up for houses, a village or a zoo.
• Maybe you can make a colorful mosaic crown to wear?
• Perhaps it turns into a place mat or picture frame.
• Be sure to display the finished mosaic.