Finished Coloring Pages – Simple Paper Cutting Art: Strips
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What do you do with your colored pages?
I started thinking about my finished coloring pages a while ago, wondering what I should do with them as they piled up.
As that pile grew, so did my collection of ideas I wanted to try making with my completed coloring pages.
The one I’m sharing today is a super simple idea using paper cutting to transform your beautiful page into a special work of art! And there aren’t many materials required to get it done.
Materials Needed:
- Finished coloring page(s) you don’t mind cutting up
- Ruler
- Pen or pencil
- Scissors
- Glue
- Large paper for background (It should be bigger than your colored page and look good with your design. (For alternatives, scroll down beyond the project instructions to ‘Variations.’)
**Read ALL directions before beginning cutting.**
Instructions
- First look at your page and decide which direction you’ll want to view it when it’s completed. (What view makes the most sense?)
- Put your colored page on a hard flat surface and measure out strips with your ruler and pencil. I measured half inch (1/2″) strips on the long side of the paper.
How you choose to measure and cut your page is up to you and the layout of your design. As you can see, the page I cut up didn’t need to be viewed a certain direction for it to make sense.
- Cut the paper in strips along the lines you traced with the ruler.
NOTE: If you want to view the page as it was before cutting, keep the strips in order as you cut them, or only cut one or two strips at a time.
- Lay the strips on your background paper in the order you want them.
- Arrange the strips so there is a little space in between each one like shown in the photo. This will help you get an idea of the spacing you have available on your background page and give you a chance to make adjustments. (This is why you need larger paper than your coloring page. If you don’t have larger paper, you can cut strips from a smaller portion of your design and use a regular sized piece of paper for your background.)
- Squeeze a small amount of glue on one strip at a time.
NOTE: In the image below, you can see the white strip at the very bottom of the photo nearest my website name. If you look closely, you can see a little of the glossy-ness of the glue. I dotted and slid a teensy amount carefully across the strip with the tip of the glue container.
(Of course it helped to have this nice little glue pen to keep better control!) If you use too much glue, you’ll have a wet mess and possibly rip the strips.
- Carefully turn the strip over and place it where you want it on your background paper. Continue gluing and placing strips until you’re are finished.
Variations:
Of course I like to get creative and make things by playing around in different ways. Instead of gluing them back in a square or rectangle on the background page, I glued them in a staggered fashion as you see in the image at the top of the post.
Another variation I used is a replacement for the background paper I listed in the Materials Section. I dug out an old scrapbook I’ve had hanging around for years and glued my finished coloring page in it. I plan to add other projects to it and will be sharing them with you as I do them.
You can get creative and make it your own too! What variations would you try? If you like weaving, there’s a variation here.
I’d love to see what you come up with! Tag me on social media or email me so I can see them! 🙂
Want to see how I failed at one project I tried using finished coloring pages? Go here.
Here’s to more coloring and creating with your finished coloring pages!
Sheri
P.S. What do you do with your colored pages? Let me know by commenting below. Also, please join my newsletter.
Update 4/23/2020
