paddles and nonpaddle paddles
 

What's a nonpaddle?

An amazing paddle would be a life size Betxi Bear polka dot dress and all. My chapter has a sister whose dad usually does them for us and they are pretty amazing. I have the following paddles: my first set of twins gave me a large Lightning McQueen from Disney Pixar's film Cars. My second set gave me a medium size traditional paddle painted hot pink, purple, and green. My final paddle from my only solo lil sis is a giant quatrefoil that is pink with a white trim and features yellow, white, and green letters/decorations. They are all adorable in VERY different ways.

Your best bet is to do something that the other person really likes or admires. For example, EVERYONE knows I am obsessed with Lightning McQueen, that is what my lils chose to make because they knew I'd love it. And then the next set simply asked me what I wanted. The last one asked her sibling whom I had already told what I wanted to some extent and she used her mind to fill in the blanks. But honestly, creativity and effort are always appreciated regardless of what it looks like!

Its usually a wooden object that could be anything besides the traditional paddle. It could be those like little boxes, a wooden heart, a little stool.

A "wall plaque"

We didn't have paddles. *wink wink nod nod*

Ahhh, gotcha. Thank you! ;)

The paddle, wall plaque, (whatever word used to describe it) I got from one of my littles was painted black and gold and had a area for a picture frame! In which was a picture of the two of us! I had never seen one like this before and I love it because it so unique!

Here's my big and I after initiation exchanging plaques/paddles. In my chapter, plaques are a requirement while paddles are optional. I thought the little paddle was cute, so i made one for my big. Because she's awesome like that :) so they're not really that amazing or anything... but I hope this might give you a bit of an idea :)

http://i302.photobucket.com/albums/n...z/101_3010.jpg

Thanks prettyboy and phimu_lindz! I love those paddles. I think simplicity may be key to what i'm aiming to do. Anyone else want to show off?

I no longer have my paddle (not a tradition at my school after my sister's pledge semester.) I made mine since my sister had one. My chapter had previously used "Sheaf of Wheat" shaped paddles made out of plywood. Mine was painted with stalks of wheat tied by a real red ribbon with AOII written at the bottom in red letters. I think I had my name on it, as well, but I don't recall. It looked really nice and was a stylized version of our NM pin. You might consider making a quill or the shape of your NM pin. Use your imagination.

My big just gave me an arrow (our chapter does this instead of paddles) yesterday after Initiation that was a bright green with bright orange polka dots! It's very bright, but very cute.
I also made one that was teal with yellow and pink accents.

But i'm sure whatever color scheme you choose she will love! =)

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...30801_2916.jpg

i wish i could explain how we do paddles here at sfa, because i know all the sororities at my school do it so different than everyone else...my chapter of dz does paddle exchanges, so that's the paddle i gave my big! the pink letters glow in the dark : ]

I used scrapbook paper for the background:
http://img523.imageshack.us/img523/6379/dscn0951kl2.jpg

What my lil made me:
http://img247.imageshack.us/img247/4...0955hh1fa0.jpg

Our family is tropical themed, hence the palm tree.


Some others from my chapter.

http://img301.imageshack.us/img301/8...0953po8ga6.jpg

I have more photos, so PM me if you'd like to see them - I don't want to upload a ton ha.

What's the Gamma Phi Lambda on the SK paddles? Is it a family thing since the other two don't have those letters?

Yeah, it's our family name. At my chapter, all the families have Greek-letter names that stand for a "secret name." I haven't heard of another chapter that does it like we do, now that I think about it.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...Paddles001.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...Paddles003.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...Paddles002.jpg

here are some up close and personal pictures of my paddle which I designed for my big sister... hope it inspires you somehow. :D

Sylvia,
That is one of the most beautiful paddles I have ever seen!

^_^ thanks so much! i worked really hard on it, i wanted it to be super unique, and it was for an amazing person. :D

Wow, Sylvia, your paddle is absolutely gorgeous. And...is that bird a replica of Fawkes from Potterpuffs? :p It looks awesome!

yeah =) our sorority mascot is a phoenix, hehe ^_^

sylvia, how long did it take you to make your paddle? just curious! i don't have that much creativity in my whole body! when i had to make mine, i bought all of the wooden letters, symbols, etc. i was too afraid to paint it b/c i thought i would mess it up. and it got kind of expensive really quickly...all of the letters and symbols add up fast!

i'm not going to lie, it took a really long time to make it all... several coats of paint on the main part and around the edges... but it was fairly inexpensive since I did all of the wording by hand with paint markers and paintbrushes. :) the rose was a 99cent piece i picked up at Michaels, it was prepainted pink, i stripped the pink off and painted that white. My paddle was like 20 or 25 dollars, I forget and then like 5ish dollars for the jewels... i had to buy several packs to find the colors I needed. Anyways, it turned out exactly how I had imagined. I'm an art major so creativity was a must! :D

It's fun to experiment with paint! I just found out yesterday that I'm getting my first little so I will be making her a small paddle I think. =)

In all, it probably took ehhhhh at least 10 hours or more I would imagine. i was very excited about making it so I forget how long I really spent on it... silly enough, I spent a lot of time just planing it out how everything was going to fit on it! On the back, I wrote a ton and I painted an oriental style tiger. :) maybe i will post pictures of that part later.... :)

Here's the paddle I got from my big sis:

http://i276.photobucket.com/albums/k...b/DSCF0588.jpg

And I don't have a close-up, but here's an old picture of me, hard at work on my lil sis's. I'm mostly done with it by this point, just gluing on the painted letters:

http://i276.photobucket.com/albums/k...b/Untitled.jpg

(sorry the pictures are so enormous)

that's really beautiful! when i was an undergrad, i didn't like the painted paddles so much. i think it was because i didn't have the skill to do a good job with them. but the examples in this thread have totally changed my mind!

I believe a nonpaddle is something thats not a paddle! lol:p:D

Where can you buy the blank nonpaddles & paddles?

Wow, we make our pledges cut their own wood and woodburn or carve or something of the like. It makes them so much more special.

:p That's a really good idea lol ... should have thought of that

Anyone can glue wooden pieces to another piece piece of wood. Even if it doesn't look like the best thing in the world, it shows they put effort into it.

Wow thanks for showing me these paddles. They're beautiful, i actually haven't made mine yet. I started making frames and boxes for some of my sisters, and other random crafts for my Big. I got the paint for my paddle but one of the colors was wrong, so i need to adjust the color and get started. sylviasushi27 your paddle is so detailed, you've inspired me to take my time so it's really as nice as i can make it.

http://i1011.photobucket.com/albums/...s/IMG_1075.jpg
I spentmy entire Thanksgiving on my big's paddle - she screamed when she unwrapped it!!

I love all of these pictures! I wish I had a picture of the anchor I made for my big!

These paddles are intense! I'm half tempted to post mine but the ones here outshine the ones any Greek at my school has done by a lot lol

My school the little made a paddle for the big, and the pledge class made for the NME and President. The NME assistant got a Teddy Bear plaque.

We also did a mini paddle exchange over one winter break.

This is one I made for the paddle exchange: http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...s/ff1b8556.jpg

I made this for a sister that I met here on GC (I think) who never had a little: http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...s/71a5ad5c.jpg

Here are my paddles:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...s/IM000029.jpg

The three big ones, the one in the middle is from my little, the other two are when I was NME.

I love my paddles :)

http://picasaweb.google.com/Jennifer...88948084494050http://picasaweb.google.com/Jennifer...88948084494050
http://i123.photobucket.com/albums/o...r/DSC01678.jpg

http://i123.photobucket.com/albums/o...r/DSC01679.jpg

http://i123.photobucket.com/albums/o...r/DSC01680.jpg
http://picasaweb.google.com/Jennifer...88955374899714

http://picasaweb.google.com/Jennifer...88959361356418

http://picasaweb.google.com/Jennifer...88955374899714

http://picasaweb.google.com/Jennifer...88959361356418

here is my warden's paddle from my pledge class that we made for him.

http://photos-b.ak.fbcdn.net/photos-...00337_7062.jpg

http://photos-c.ak.fbcdn.net/photos-...00338_7248.jpg

yes, we made a sword.

I would post pictures of the paddle I made my big but can't find any. however here are some of our class paddles.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3110/...222cbe.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3168/...6d55f4.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3164/...0af5c3.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3035/...7381dd.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3004/...d92aab.jpg?v=0

The one in the lower left corner of the first pic is mine.

Well since other guys did it... :P

The color doesn't come through b/c I took the pictures on my cell phone but you can still see details. Someone took better pictures but has yet to post them.

For my Big Bro :D

http://photos-f.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos..._1946169_n.jpg

http://photos-h.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos...1_785277_n.jpg

http://photos-a.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos..._2537333_n.jpg

http://photos-b.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos...3_650546_n.jpg

ETA: Apparently swords are popular with guys? lol We each have one in our posts!