How To Decorate a Ship With Patterned Paper

Scrap O' Luck

Here's a detailed tutorial for decorating a ship with patterned paper. It was originally posted as a Special Ops Training project for the SWAT blog in 2013. Don't let these pretty pieces of wood and paper intimidate you. The step by step instructions are a cinch!

Supplies:

Art Minds wooden puzzle: Military Sailing Ship

5 sheets patterned cardstock

Acrylic Paint

Twine

Rubber Cement

Glossy Accents

Craft Knife

Large Needle

Step 1:Purchase a wood puzzle ship kit. I get mine from Amazon. 

Step 2:Color the corresponding pieces as shown in the following schematic. 

A schematic is included in the kit.



Step 3: On the back of each wooden sheet of puzzle pieces, label each piece using a ball point pen.

Step 4: Very carefully punch each piece out. Keep in mind the pieces are fragile and will separate in layers or splinters if you are not VERY careful.

Step 5: Use the color clues in the above schematic to complete steps 6 through 9. Each color is a different piece of patterned cardstock. On the "Scrap O' Luck" I used the following colors of patterned paper for each color represented above:

Blue --- white with sparkle green pattern

Purple --- Solid black with a flourish

Yellow --- Black and Green polka dot

Orange --- Green polka dot

Green --- News Print

Orange and Green were made out of the same pattern of double sided paper. The Orange were traced on one side and the Green on the other.

Step 6: Orange and Green pieces are sails. Use different pieces of patterned cardstock for each color. Be aware that the sales will be seen from both sides so use double sided paper that compliments your ship theme. The first and third set of sales are colored orange in the above schematic.

Step 7: Four of the puzzle pieces will be covered with patterned paper on both side. Those are indicated with arrows.

Step 8: The remaining colored pieces will have paint on one side and paper on the other.

Step 9: The pieces without any color will be painted on both sides, but will not be covered.

Step 10: Paint sides and edges of all the puzzle pieces, let dry. One coat of paint is fine.

Step 11: Trace puzzle piece onto wrong side of patterned paper with painted side face up, cut out, and adhere. I prefer to work with Rubber Cement, but I am sure Mod Podge would work fabulously.

Step 12: Follow the step by step instructions included with the ship to assemble the pieces. Have your craft knife ready to trim the edges of the wood joints or of the paper. I found that many of my pieces looked like this before the ship would fit together properly:

Any places that I over cut or roughed up I camouflaged with ink. In a few places I broke the thin wooden pieces. These I re-attached with Glossy Accents.

Step 13: Because you are adding paper to many of the pieces the actual width will change. The pieces will not fit in the same way and some will not fit at all. I had the following pieces left over.

Step 14: If you plan to glue the ship, put it together without glue first to be sure you know where each piece will go and if you will need to leave any pieces out.

Step 15: Replace the string included in the ship kit with twine. Rig the sails as per the instructions.

During the months of June and July I will be moving my crafting space. I won't have time for much crafting so I will be posting previous projects. I'll be back with brand new content in August!!!

Scrap On!

~charity hotrum~