Saturday, March 04, 2006

Lucky Stars

Lucky stars are so cool. Last summer I was obsessed with origami. I stumbled across Lucky Stars when I was searching the internet for a star folding pattern. I was intrigued. I took some catalogs and cut strips like the website I discovered explained. I was hooked! The tiny stars are so cute. I made them in all sorts of sizes and colors. My desk was littered with them.

That Fall, in Montreal's Chinatown where I was hunting for Pocky*, I saw a small basket full of Lucky Star Strips. They were a dollar a pack (about 150 strips). I knew from the web that it was a great deal. I bought all the packs of hologram pastels (5 or 6 packs) and then I picked up 2 packs of the strips pictured above.

I used up all the hologram pastel strips right away. I was a Lucky Star Factory for about a month. Everyone and their mother had a pile of shiny stars from me. When I got to these strips I didn't really like the way they came out when the printed side was showing. I started making them with the white side showing. I was ecstatic when I discovered blobs of glow-in-the-dark paint on the back of the strip!  Too cool.

The paper made for lucky stars is thicker than magazine/catalog paper and soooo much easier to work with. If you make your own strips, be sure to make them pretty long compared to their width. The more times your strip gets folded around, the better the star will puff up when you press in the sides. The hardest part for me was figuring out the mechanics of tying a knot in a strip of paper. Once you get that, you're golden.

* If you are a fan of Engrish.com, check out Glico's site. Here is some Pocky marketing copy from the site, "Glico's various unique ideas incorporated in its confectionery establish exciting new directions for chocolate products." I'm a huge fan of Japanese companys' fearless use of English on their products, whether it's funny, weird, or unexplainable.
5 Comments leave a comment


pedalpower said ...
1/24/2007 8:36 AM
Our exchange student from Thailand last year made these. She says in Thailand when you have a crush on a boy you make him a jar full of these. She made a jar of pink and white ones for a boy here. She arranged the pink and white stars into a pattern in a glass jar.


Celeste said ...
7/5/2008 10:08 AM
These stars are addicting, I make jars filled with these as gifts (i don't even have to look at the strip while i make them anymore lol) and they are always a hit. If you make your own strips, a paper shredder (like the $10 ones from staples)is a GREAT tool. You just shred the paper, and in ten minutes you can have thousands of papers to keep you going... and they tend to (with regular magazine paper) need to be shredded and then cut in half because with the whole strip its to long... My friend got me addicted to these and cranes, so now i always have a little container with star paper and a little pad of square paper lol.... well good luck with your stars :D msg me if you want (cdmoir@msn.com) or drop me an e-mail if you want, i love talking to other people who make these :D


Drew's cutest fan girl said ...
8/18/2008 7:30 AM
Wow!I know how to make those, but I can't seem to make it puff out.But thanks to you, I know what the problem is.I need that kind of paper.Those lucky star strips.I wonder if they sell those in the Philippines...I wish they do!


Drew's cutest fan girl said ...
8/18/2008 7:33 AM
I love lucky stars!I keep making those but I mess up when it comes to the puffing...

 
Jt's Love said ...
10/9/2008 8:40 PM
My best friend and I stumbled across these and mastered them! everyone in my school wants to learn but we tell them it's our thing ;)
all the colors and jar full of stars is great! I have been obsessed with star shapes forever and this tops it off!!


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