This post is still a work in progress.

Basic Red Chinese Lantern Photo Cube

Whether you make the basic Chinese Lantern or embellish yours with tassels or dragons, this photo cube is simple to put together and versatile. And if you don’t have any Chinese ancestors all you have to do is change the color scheme and embellishments and you can make this lovely “Mothers Day Tulip” shaped photo cube.

Simple lantern decorated with Dragon Heads, A Tassel and the Chinese Character for “Wong”.

For Bright Red Chinese Lantern template CLICK HERE

For Dirty Pour Chinese Lantern template CLICK HERE

For Tulip Lantern template CLICK HERE

I would recommend printing several copies at home on your printer if you have one to practice your cutting and folding.

Cut out the Chinese Lantern Template.

Fold each section of the Chinese Lantern template and press crisply.

Repeat the folding process at the bottom of the photos and press crisply.

Lay on the table and press firmly with your finger.

Gently flatten the Chinese Lantern Template.

Fold all of the Vertical lines of the template.

Pinch the vertical lines crisply.

Fold each of the glue tabs.

It is important that the fold is pinched crisply.

Use double sided tape on all of the glue tabs and the side tab. It is important that the tape cover the entire tab. Either use glue tape which I found worked best or hot glue. Trying to use contact cement was frustrating (for me) and it was next to impossible to hold position while regular craft glue set up.

ADDITIONAL STEPS INSERTED HERE

Examples Of  Various Embellishments

Chinese knots and tassels make great embellishments for the Chinese Lanterns.

More complex tassels are easy to assemble.

CROSSWORD PUZZLES IN YOUR HISTORY & PHOTO BOOKS

One interesting way to get past the “Same Ole – Same Ole” in your family history and photo albums is to add a crossword puzzle whose clues must be gleaned from the content of the book.

In a family history book I did a crossword puzzle that used surnames as the answers. For the clues I went through and used everything from occupations, birth dates and locations and even the color of a shirt. Where people were married and what kind of pets they enjoyed (based on pictures found in the book) as well as who they were the father of, for example: the father of David. While the were numerous Davids in the book only one surname fit the number puzzle.

You definitely want to put the answer key in the back of the book.

CROSSWORD PUZZLES FOR FAMILY REUNIONS

Another great use for Crossword puzzles is an ice breaker at a family reunion. Depending on how co-operative your family is the questions could be anything from occupations, to get people talking to each other to physical traits, tall or red hair for example. If you are 100 percent sure of attendance you could have a clue of the oldest person or youngest person in attendance, who traveled the farthest to attend or where somebody graduated college. If you intend on wearing a polka dot shirt that could be your clue ! The possibility for clues are endless.

Since the odds are there will be lots of people with the same surname you might consider using first names and nick names also. Remembering you CAN use the same word more than once since the object will be to put the names in the right spots to work with the other words in the puzzle.

THE TOTALLY EASY WAY TO CREATE YOUR CROSSWORD PUZZLE

Once you come up with the Answer/Clue list all you have to do is go to one of the many free online crossword creators. Most often directed towards teachers they are all basically the same. Fill in the answer and the clue for each word and hit “Create” and they generate both the puzzle and the key to download. Some have different options, but they are all basically the same.

FREE CROSSWORD PUZZLE GENERATORS

Here are four, that I have used.

The Teacher’s Corner Puzzle Generator

Crossword Hobbist Generator

Education.com Crossword Generator

Discovery Education Generator

EXAMPLES OF CROSSWORDS I HAVE DONE

In my examples below, I typed in the questions directly on the page to make the columns fit perfectly, and used Photoshop to knock out the back ground of the puzzle and saved it as a transparent png file so that when I uploaded it you could see the background of the page. But I am a picky artist and if you don’t have the programs to manipulate the graphics it still looks great and is an interesting addition.

Crossword puzzle from the Wheatley Family History and Photo Album created by Jackie Whedbee

Example of crossword puzzle answer page from the Wheatley Family History and Photo Album created by Jackie Whedbee