Make Gift Necklaces From the Sunday Funnies!

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by B. A. Bennett

OK, young'uns. This one's for you! Here's how to make a necklace to give to Mom this Christmas. And you can do it all by yourself (well, with maybe just a little help from Dad or an older brother or sister).

Pull off a layer of the funnies from the Sunday paper. Open the double sheet out flat on a hard surface (the kitchen floor or a table that it won't hurt to work on).

Then use a yardstick and a pencil to measure off and mark a series of dots. These dots start on the upper left corner of the paper right where the color begins. And they're spaced an inch and a half apart all the way across the double-sheet to where the color ends on the paper's right edge.

Next draw a second series of dots across the paper's bottom. This series will be spaced an inch and a half apart too ... but it is started three-quarters of an inch in from where the color starts on the sheet.

(Do you see why the top row of dots starts at the edge of the color while the bottom row starts in three-quarters of an inch from the color's edge? It's so a series of long, skinny triangles will be formed when the dots are connected by straight lines.)

Now cut out the long, skinny triangles. You should get about 30 or 32 of them from the double-sheet of paper and each one should be approximately 20 inches long. (Don't worry about how many you get from a sheet or about how long they are. All newspapers are not the same size. Your triangles will be close enough to this "average" size to work. And if you don't cut enough from your first sheet of paper ... well, you can cut a few more from another!)

You're now ready to roll your strips into beads. You'll need some round toothpicks and library paste (not glue) for this step.

Take one of the long strips and trim a little sliver off each side of its base. Not a lot ... just enough to remove the points from the base's corners. Then lay the strip-with its most colorful side down-on a covered work surface. (It's important for you to cover your work surface with several layers of "regular" newspaper so you won't get paste on the floor or table.)

Next, "spot paste" the long paper triangle with small dabs of your adhesive. Don't use a lot of paste. Just space a spot of the adhesive every inch or so along the length of the triangle.