Gator Clip (DIY) ~Winner Announced~

Congrats to the winner of the the Gator clip give-away from my 100th post!

Elly was chosen randomly with the number generator at Random.org.
Elly's big plans for the clips: "I would use it to keep papers together in my classroom... and to jazz up my desk!"
i hope you enjoy them, Elly!  Thanks for entering, everyone!
If you didn't win, don't fret.  You can easily make a set of your own, here's how:

You will need:

clothes pins

small wooden balls or beads

small wooden spools

E-6000 glue or a hot glue gun

acrylic paints

Start by taking the clothes pins apart and laying the sections out on paper to paint the inside.  The bumpy sections will be the inside of the gator's mouth: paint them pink.  The smooth sections are the back of the head, paint them green.

Once the pieces have dried, put the clothespins back together.  You might need pliers to do this.

Use E-6000 glue or the glue gun to attach the nose and eyes.  Attach the spool to the edge of the clothespin (above the portion painted pink) for the snout and attach the wooden balls for eyes.  They should be glued about half an inch back from the other end of the clothespin.  To pinch the the clothespin open, you will need the space behind the eyes for your finger.

On my gators, the eyes kept rolling off, so I lined them up with the eyes touching to hold them in place until the glue dried.

Next, paint the mouth pink.  Paint the sides and the ends of the clothespin sections below the snout.  Don't worry about having the paint perfect, you will go over it with white teeth and green to tough it up when you're finished.

Use black to paint the inside of the spool for nostrils as well.

Paint the top surface of the clothespin green, including the snout and eyeballs.

After the top surface dries, flip the clothespin over and paint the sides and bottom.  Let the clip rest upside down on the snout and eyes to try.

Once the green paint has dried, use white to add the teeth.


After the white paint dries, use the green again to go over any areas where the white paint went out of the lines any any areas where the woon grain is still visible (notice that my gator clips needed a lot of green pain to cover mistakes).

Use white and black paint to create pupils on the eyeballs.

If you'd like a little more detail and color, use another color to add spots to your gator.  I used a dark golden yellow.



Once the paint is dry, your gator is good to go!

Suggested uses:

Chip clip

Tie clip

Money clip

Glove clip