Scherrenschnitte

It's a long word and I won't even pretend to tell you how to pronounce it. It's easier to say "paper cutting" because that's what it is. I've always enjoyed paper art such as origami, scrapbooking, and paper cutting. It's amazing to me what you can do with a pair of scissors and a piece of paper...or in the case of origami, just the paper.

Here's a papercutting that I did for my friends Rick and Patti (my daughter-in-laws parents) as a gift for their 25th wedding anniversary. Since then I've done a different patterned heart for another friend from work who just celebrated her 40th anniversary. The moose design you see in my sidebar is my own creation although I did borrow the idea from a deer scherrenschnitte pattern I saw. I've also done other designs in the past but never bothered to take a picture.

The first took me approximately 10 hours cutting time. The second was less, I'd guess around 5 hours. I use a very tiny sharp scissors and crisp paper almost like cardstock (although most of the directions I read suggest using tissue paper!).