It's a perfect time to sing & dance!

Oh, Come All Ye Faithful... Joyful & Triumphant... Oh Come Ye, Oh Come Ye to Show & Tell...

( Yes, you guessed it!  I love Christmas Carols and it's the one time of the year I can usually get away with breaking out into song anytime I choose!! You are lucky though, I have not figured out a way to add audio to my Blog!!)

But I digress.. our Show & Tell today is a fun way to include some interactive ornaments to your Christmas trees. My "Dancing Elf" is just one example of the characters that you can create to tempt everyone's "inner child" to come out & play!! 

I started by creating a basic puppet style figure of an Elf out of 140# watercolor paper. I  decorated his body with Spectrum Noir markers w/Ink details.  I then attached all of his limbs with small brads, the key here is to not tighten them but to leave them loose enough for the "Dancing" motion as you pull the attached strings down... see below, here is a view of the back side of the Elf. As you can see there are 4 strings that are attached to the very tips of the arms & legs. The strings are then gathered and knotted at the base of body & again about an inch farther down, this keeps strings from getting in the way of the movement... refer to pic, it really is a lot easier than it sounds!  

Back side of "Dancing Elf" - notice the string placement

Below is the finished "Dancing Elf"... all you have to do is tug on the hanging strings in a downward motion & he will jump, as you release the strings he goes back to his standing position... do this repeatedly and he will dance his way into your heart!!

"Dancing Elf" in relaxed hanging position

"Dancing Elf" in jumping position when string is pulled down

Hope you give this idea a try... as previously mentioned you can make a variety of characters, just let your muse run loose and as usual...Have Fun!!