Origami Birthday Cards and "Cootie Catchers"

I don't know about you, but I get bored with the same old birthday card every year. Today was my beloved husband's birthday and just a few days ago I was drawing a big blank for what to do. All I knew is that I did not want it boring. As usual, everything got in the way. My schedule was beyond full with elementary school meetings, church meetings, class assignments, cooking meals, and oh, yeah, my full time job.

As I got home from picking up the kids from school Thursday night, I told them to go inside and make Daddy a nice birthday card. Do you remember the little origami fortune tellers, sometimes called cootie catchers, that we folded back in childhood? I remember having hours of fun with those things. We folded them in Sunday school, Girl Scouts, and all the time at home.

Created by Ian Moore
Right now, my sons are going through an origami phase, though theirs is more of a Star Wars origami, based on the series of books that started with The Strange Case of Origami Yoda. For days I have had origami Yodas, Jabba the Puppets, and Fortune Wookies overtaking my house. The boys had spent the entire trip home from school folding Yodas and Wookies. I could see that there was no way they were going to stop, even to make Daddy a card or do their chores.

You know what they say--if you can't beat 'em, use 'em. So as I was parking in the driveway it hit me--make origami birthday cards! The first image was to use a Fortune Wookie as a birthday card, placing multiple birthday messages inside where the message goes.

Created by Ian Moore
 Created by Ian Moore


Created by Ian Moore
My oldest son, Ian had a blast creating his. He actually made two different ones before he was satisfied that it was good enough for his daddy. He included messages like "World's Greatest Dad!" and "Cool card for a cool Dad." He loved it. My youngest son made a Jabba the Puppet and wrote "Happy Birthday" in the mouth of the figure. This was tons of fun and gave us a unique set of birthday "cards" for Daddy for his big day. He loved the cards and now he'll always remember this birthday. 

In retrospect, I see this as a great idea for other things too--like birthday party goodie bags. You can put "thank you" notes in the message area. "Thanks for celebrating with me!" "The greatest gift is fun with you." Other stuff like that. There might even be potential for a game in all this. :)

Comments

Michael D. Moore said…
This was awesome. Ian and Connor are so creative and amazing. I hope that they never lose this spirit of wonder about everything that they have now.
May 4, 2014 at 5:47 PM
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