Fir and pine cones are useful for making interesting crafts. If you find yourself in the forest, do not forget to take with you several pine and spruce fruits. You can make very beautiful birds from the cones of different trees. Today you will learn how to create a swan, crow, ostrich and eagle owl. Crafts made from bird cones will also require additional materials.
To work you will need the following components:
- awl;
- knife;
- toothpicks;
- plasticine;
- acorns with caps;
- alder cones;
- pine and spruce cones;
- heat gun.
Swan
A swan - a bird made from cones - is quite simple to make, you just need to know the order of work. To make it, take a large semi-closed pine cone and white, black and red plasticine.
Use white plasticine to sculpt an oblong neck with a head, red for the beak, and black for the eyes.
Attach the plasticine blank to the blunt end of the pine cone.
The swan is ready!
If desired, the wings and tail can be made from dry grass or real feathers. To sculpt a black swan, you need to use black plasticine instead of white.
Birdhouses made from milk bottles
Don’t rush to throw away milk bottles and Kinder surprise containers, because you can make an attractive craft out of them. Round holes are cut in milk bottles, clothespins are glued to the bottom of the bottles, and the birds themselves are on them in the form of kinder boxes. Just decorate the birds' bodies with down or feathers, colored paper, and also draw eyes on them with a felt-tip pen, then the craft will be completely ready.
Crow
To create this bird, you need to take 2 small pine cones, acorn caps and plasticine in three shades (yellow, white and black).
Connect the cones together as shown in the photo.
Make legs from acorn caps. Natural material can be fixed using a heat gun.
Instead of hot glue, you can also try holding the pine cones together with plasticine.
Make a beak from yellow plasticine. Black and white plasticine is needed to make eyes. And pieces of black material are suitable for forming bird wings.
This is such a funny crow!
It can be placed on a branch that will imitate a tree.
Peacock from bottles
You will need multi-colored plastic bottles, foil, thin plastic, a log, a metal rod, foam, a stapler and glue. The body of the peacock along with the head is formed from polystyrene foam. Small indentations are made in the intended places for the eyes.
The log will be used as a base; you need to attach the peacock's body to it using a metal rod.
Feathers are sold from cut plastic bottles of different sizes: the longest for the tail, the shortest for the neck and normal size for the rest of the body.
One part of the future feather is rounded, and notches are made on the other to give a more realistic look to the feather. The tail feathers can be decorated with cutouts made of thin plastic and foil.
Decorations can be attached with a stapler or superglue. A beak is cut out of a piece of red plastic. The “feathers” are glued with a slight overlap onto each other to the body with superglue. You can make the crest the way your heart desires, but it is better to use colored plastic to create it.
The recesses for the eyes are painted over with felt-tip pens of any color. It is convenient to use some kind of mesh to form the tail. Its collection begins from the bottom edge. The made tail is attached to the body.
Ostrich
Another version of a bird made from cones and plasticine is the ostrich. To get this big bird, you need to get a fir cone. You will also need plasticine (black and brown), toothpicks and a couple of acorns.
Using an awl, make holes in the cone and insert toothpicks into them. These will be the legs of the ostrich.
Stick the acorn to an oval blank made of brown plasticine.
Fix the neck with the acorn on the upper edge of the cone. Attach the acorn caps to the ends of the toothpicks, after making holes in them using an awl.
All that remains is to sculpt the beak and eyes from black and white plasticine.
A tuft made from a miniature alder cone, which can be attached to the acorn using a heat gun, will look very good.
This is what a finished ostrich looks like!
You can decorate the edge of the cone with feathers or inflorescences of dry plants.
Application "Firebird"
To create such a craft, you will need pre-dried leaves of trees (linden, rose hips, birch, oak, etc.) of various colors, as well as large seeds, for example, pumpkins. Linden and birch leaves are glued onto a sheet of cardboard, which will serve as the body and head, respectively.
A fluffy tail is made from rosehip leaves; you can also add a small tree branch for a strong base. The seeds form the eyes and small details of the craft.
A tuft from some branch will help to completely decorate the “Firebird”. You can safely send this bird craft to an exhibition in a kindergarten.
Owl
To make it you will need a long fir cone. You also need 2 acorn caps and plasticine in black, brown and yellow.
This bird has very expressive eyes, which can be easily made from the caps of acorns. To make them even more expressive, you can stick a black pupil on a yellow background on top of each one. For this, plasticine of the appropriate color is used.
From brown material it is necessary to fashion feathers that will be located above the eyes.
The finished parts are fixed at the top of the cone.
You need to stick a yellow beak under them.
Tufts of feathers over the eyes can also be made from small alder cones. They look great too.
And if you glue pine cones on the sides, the bird will have wings.
This is such an amazing eagle owl! It looks almost like the real thing.
You can create excellent crafts from natural ingredients using plasticine. Your children will love to take part in this exciting activity. And if you put all the birds together, you will get an excellent story-driven craft that will take its rightful place at a school handicraft exhibition.
Flamingo from bottles
To make this product you need large plastic bottles (5 and 10 liters), a polymer pipe about two meters long, a corrugated pipe about sixty centimeters long, acrylic, wire, foam.
The base body is made from the largest bottle. In its bottom you need to cut 2 holes according to the diameter of the polymer tubes (future legs). Feathers are cut from smaller five-liter bottles and attached to slits in the body.
A neck is made from a corrugated pipe, which is inserted into the neck of a ten-liter bottle. The head is cut out of foam plastic. Eyes are drawn with a felt-tip pen and a black plastic beak is attached. It is better to start attaching the feathers from the very bottom to the mesh.
Auxiliary materials for work
Having chosen models for independent work, you should organize your workplace and provide high-quality lighting (natural and artificial light sources). You will also need the following set:
- Patterns in the shape of birds.
- Scissors.
- Threads, needles.
- Glue.
- Felt.
- Decorative elements (beads, rhinestones).
- Metal wire.
- Paper clips.
- Plywood sheet.
- Cardboard.
- Colored and corrugated paper.
Instructions for work and sketches of birds will be useful to the craftsman in the process of making crafts.
Selection of base material
Original birds can be made from a wide variety of materials:
- Colored or corrugated paper.
- Cardboard (regular or corrugated version).
- Plywood sheet.
- Gypsum. Gypsum birds have a rich relief and are an excellent structure for subsequent decoration.
- Felt. Felt birds are often used to decorate wall panels in the dining area, bedroom or children's playroom.
- The material of choice can be salt dough or polymer clay. The figures, sculpted from working mass, have volume and beautiful lines.
- Bird made of woven metal wire. Can be used as a pendant, a figure on a backpack, a medallion, or jewelry (especially if chenille wire is used).
- Bead weaving is also a possible option for the craftsman to work with. To work, you will need a pre-compiled weaving pattern and careful selection of beads.
Some bird-shaped crafts are used as New Year's decorations, a gift for a loved one, a souvenir for a friend, or an exhibit for an exhibition.
