If you sponsor a little girl... a handmade gift suggestion

I have always wanted to send my sponsored children gifts that I made myself. There are strict regulations on the types of gifts that you can send - they must be made of paper, but you can send small bits of ribbon. they can not be bigger than 8x10 and a foldest stack can not be bigger than 1/8" thick. It's perfectly acceptable to send financial gifts. With a financial gift, the staff at the Compassion center can go out and find out just what your child needs and they buy it for them. By spending this money locally, it also helps the local economy in the area.

But anyway... back to my original idea of this post. Several months ago, I thought of the idea to send Haoua a gift of paper dolls. Look at these -

I printed these dolls out on Card Stock. And then, before I cut them out, I put reinforced, clear packing tape on the back of the doll. I made sure that the packing tape went over where I would cut. Then, when I went to cut it out, the packing tape created a very strong support to help support the paper and prevent it from tearing.

When I colored the dolls with colored pencil, I made one doll white/cream colored and the other one brown. BUT! I colored their clothes the SAME color - pink shorts and a baby blue top. I labeled one Haoua and the other Morgan, for my daughter.

With the clothes, I did the sam thing. But the tape did make it difficult to fold the tabs back, so I used a craft knife to score the fold lines to break the reinforced tape string.

I have wondered if Haoua has played with her paper dolls or if she has just kept them safe and treasured. She has two little sisters now and I have wondered if they are all still intact! I will ask her in my next letter and see if she would like some more dolls. Perhaps I should make a whole set JUST for her little sister.

You can find the paper dolls I used at Marilee's Paper Dolls.

If anyone comes up with a creative, homemade gift for a little boy, please share it!