big/ little crafts!

[phi_sig_girlie]

i just got my first little sunday, and i am so excited... but right now i am having a major creativity block.. what kind of crafty things did you make for your little & what kind of things did you absolutely love getting from your bigs??

[ForeverRoses]

Any chapter traditions? You could:

cover a photo album/scrapbook with material and then decorate the cover with those wooden letters and even pre-decorate some of the inside pages with things like greek week, homecoming, initiation, etc.

Use fabric paint to draw stick figure girls on a pillow case and write something like "big and little" or maybe a cute saying

decorate plain acrylic picture frames

decorate any glass or plastic item- candy jars, cups, boda bags, etc

[RaggedyAnn]

I made a journal listing all family traditions for my littles. They could add their own thoughts and pass it down.

Candles can be decorated easily with stickers. I painted a nonpaddle for my little for revealing. Our mascot was RaggedyAnn, so I had her hands covering her eyes. We also made pillows for our littles and cross-stitched the front in my family with a pattern. You could make doorknockers as well.

[ASTalumna06]

For big/little night, the littles buy a piece of fabric of their liking, usually at Wal-Mart, a yard or two in length. That night, the bigs and littles make t-shirts together. The letters on the t-shirt are made from the fabric the littles picked out. Also, they cover their new member binders with the fabric. After that, their bigs take what’s left of the fabric with them. We have a tradition in my chapter that while the littles make paddles for their bigs, the bigs make pillows for their littles, and they use the leftover fabric for that. The pillow is similar to a paddle in that it is to include our letters, the big’s and little’s names (nicknames are optional), our chapter, the big’s and little’s new member class designations, and the semester. But girls get really creative with the pillows. For one family tree, all of their pillows are shapes. One girl had three littles, and she made one little an anchor, another one a yellow rose, and another one was a teddy bear (our mascot). One of them then made their little, who is nicknamed Pink Panther, a pillow in the shape of a panther. It was awesome. And her fabric was a leopard-type print, so it looked really good.

Another big thing for us, on top of making lettered shirts, is to decorate canvas tote bags. We do the same iron-on fabric thing that we do with the shirts. Most of the girls will use them to carry their officer binders to the meetings.

Picture frames are always popular.

Wooden jewelry boxes. You can buy them at A.C. Moore or Michaels and decorate them however you want. And go to these stores anyway for craft stuff. There are usually a lot of things that say “sisters” on them.

And my great grandlittle is currently making her little a framed collage of pictures of our family tree to give to her at initiation.

There are a TON of things you could do.

[AOII Angel]

We always painted bulletin boards and lap boards for our little sisters. I had three little sisters, and each got a bulletin board painted with Raggedy Ann and Andy in a swing (Raggedy Ann was our local mascot) with a big red, raffia bow on top. I used paint pens. You can actually blow up a picture of the item you want to paint using a copy machine. Cut out the outside border of the object and trace on the bulletin board. If you have artistic talent, fill in the detail, or cut out each detail and trace into place. The rest is like coloring in a color book!

[KSUViolet06]

Items that Big Sisters have made for their Little Sisters (in my collegiate chapter):

*badge boxes
*fleece blankets (embroidered with girl's name and initiation date).
*picture frames
*hand-painted wooden Sigmas
*bulletin boards

[LightBulb]

I was also going to suggest bulletin boards. Painted (use paint pens for designs) or covered in fabric, these are always a hit.

Another good thing is to make something to hang on the doorknob. It's an easy way to show your letters.

[sailboatgirl]

One thing we did when I was in school that I haven't seen listed is painting trashcans with paintpens. We'd get white plastic trash cans and then decorate them with paint pens...they'd have our letters, big-little/family names, sailboats, violets, skull & crossbones, etc. Then on the back, we'd put our family trees.

[aphrodite08]

Hi,

I am an active duty Marine who is an artist.......I am from Statesboro, Georgia (I was an art student) where I attended Georgia Southern University and did lots of T-shirt designs for the Greek community there. I had lots of work painting and designing paddles that were VERY cute and customized for the sorority members. I can create anything that you want, whether it be picture frames, makeup bags, martini glasses, doorknob hangers, Christmas ornaments, canvas totes, etc, but my paddles were the biggest hit because they are so original and personal. Check out my website: kellybrockway.com or email me at: kelly.brockway@comcast.net to let me know if you would like to commission me to create a paddle for you or your sister!