SCHERENSCHNITTE (German Paper Cuts):

                    Heart Designs

The heart shape is fun to work with in paper.  First, you choose a piece of paper with the color that you want and fold it in half.  You then draw half of your design with pencil and cut out the negative spaces (holes) with a pair of sharp-pointed scissors.  When you have a design that isn't completely symmetrical, like the boy and girl in the heart, you cut out the heart leaf design first and complete the cutting of the people separately.  Otherwise, you would have two identical people face to face.  When the design is unfolded, the delicate paper cut is glued carefully on the card stock background and matted..

Paper Cut Valentines

HEARTS IN SYMMETRY Paper Cutting

I measured and lightly drew lines with pencil from the center of the poster board, horizontally and vertically and then from each corner. Then I proceeded to cut out 4 hearts freehand with no patterns (by folding and cutting half of a heart each time). I saved the inside cutout as that was also a heart. Then I had hearts with heart holes in them and regular hearts. I did this with a multitude of different colors and paper and many different sizes of hearts. Then I began to arrange the hearts from the center outward. I glued some right-side-up and others up-side-down, every which way that was pleasing to me. From the scraps I added curlicues to give the piece pazzazz. As my poster board was not square, I added a line of hearts across the top and bottom, to balance off the piece.

Valentine Design Tea Bag Folding

Valentine Design Tea Bag Folding

Tea Bag Folding is a fascinating folk art to learn and is very rewarding when you understand the folds in creating your design. The paper with repeat designs can be found online and downloaded, to use for your creations. The 1 1/2" squares are cut apart and then folded into intricate Origami (Japanese Paper Folding) shapes. I usually fold my card stock paper in half to make the card, measure horizontally and vertically with a light pencil line, and then glue the shapes where they look the most interesting to me. Pieces of rolled clear tape can be used so that you can move your shapes around until you decide on your finished placement.