2021

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After the success of my sloth piñata, my aunt asked for a Pokémon piñata for her grandson's 2nd b-day.

We looked at hundreds of Pokémon pics.

We decided that we wanted
1) Pikachu & 2) a pokeball.

I found this 2D pic of Pikachu & this 3D-ish picture of Baby Yoda & decided to combine the 2 ideas.

(Baby Yoda is flat on the back.)

Mom likes them full balls, lol.

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So, she bought me a pack
of these punching balloons
which are bigger & rounder
than the average balloon.

Everything was going great... until I woke up and found that the balloon had popped & the paper I'd glued around it had shrunk...

(Please ignore where the molding
is supposed to go on the top of my walls.)

I could start over but... took a chance, ripped out the broken balloon from inside & inflated a new balloon inside. 🤷🏻‍♀️

I had originally just used glue & no water, so the paper was really stuck together. It just wasn't hard yet.

I knocked around the balloon & poked it with my finger, & circled any weak spots. I then glued more paper to those areas, making sure to keep that perfectly round shape. ⭕

I cut the shape of Pikachu from a box that had thin cardboard, then stuffed, and taped newspaper around it to get those sexy curves, lol.

Meanwhile, I cut the ball in half, stapled where my stapler could reach, used masking tape, & glued more paper strips to connect the halves firmly.

Both got sprayed down in white a few times. Specifically the ball to make it firm. I was worried it's roundness would warp or be weak. Especially if I planned for all the weight to hang from that top part.

If you want your balls to be smoother, you can always sand before spray painting or between sprays.

Also, if you paint your piñata white or the correct color, the tissue color will pop & not get muddied by the color of materials used to make the form.

I hope these drawings make sense, lol. I made 2 circles out of foamboard with slits & put one inside the other, used tape to keep them in place & sprayed it all black.

Not only does it hide where the candy would be, but it firms up the outer shell.

Carefully wrapped Pikachu with yellow crepé.

Anyway, flashforward to my mom flying to see my aunt's fam with Pikachu!

The tips of the ears is black crepe.

The face I made using sharpies on cardstock.

Pikachu's tail was added last, along with the brown stripes on the back of Pikachu which I painted.

I had gift bags (red/blue/balloons) & cut them up to make tiny flags, tiny gifts, & spelled out CASSIAN.

(Years ago, my mom bought me precut letters in teal. I still had some, so I traced them, but made them thinner as I went along, so they would fit.)

It was a toss up if I would leave the ball spray painted or cover it in tissue, & if I did... what would the tissue shape be?

My mom wad adamant I had to wrap the piñata in tissue. We picked a round shape for the crepé.

I stapled black crepe & stapled the circle on the front. The circle was made by tracing a roll of tape with a sharpie marker.

(Totally forgot to mention until I saw this pic. I cut various pieces of cardboard into circles & glued them together, then covered in black to make a stand for the pokeball.)

How was Pikachu attached? Tied by the neck to the back background with a matching yellow ribbon. So, he's technically removable.

^ That yellow stuff with the gifts
is crepé paper that fell off the piñata stick.

This is my younger cousin with his first born.

Wow, how time flies. I remember seeing my cousin come home from the hospital.