My friends and I try to get together on Friday nights for dinner. This Friday happens to fall on a friend's birthday so we invited him to join us. We normally ask where they would like to eat when it's their birthday. Occasionally they have a preference or suggest a place. This time, he said he had no preference and anything is fine. So I jokingly said we would take him to McD's! His reply was "Alright happy meal it is". So I decided to be funny and make him a happy meal. I had already brought him a gift- a Cu-Poche figurine. Sadly the toy is too big to fit into a regular size happy meal box from McD's. So my solution: Make one! but it had to be an extra big one to fit his toy (yes we are all adults but always kids at heart).
Here are some pictures on the process:
Now because I was being lazy I decided to paper fold the box (instead of using poster board or a template). It took a couple tries to make the sides stay up (otherwise it would just look like a brown bag which I was tempted to just use.) but I managed to make a decent looking box... (using my origami skills! oh yeah!) I also didn't like the shade of red cardstock I had so I opted out of coloring it red. I did make a smiley hopefully that's enough to be obvious. I glued extra paper with handles on top so it looks like an McD's box.
Can't be a happy meal without the actual meal right? Haha. So I made a burger and fries out of felt. (jokes on me more work! but happy to give you a tutorial)
Some tools I used: Felting needles, foam board, some protective leather fingers, wool of different colors, (not shown: eyelets, red, white wool, superglue, wire created as clasps).
First I mixed the amber and sunset colors to make the bun look more realistic. There is a special brush to mix wool fibers. Sadly I do not have this tool. So what I do is pull apart the wool and mix both while pulling; repeatedly. The wool did not mix as evenly as I liked. It looked more like chicken nuggets. I was very tempted to just make more chicken nuggets but decided to stick with the burger. So I added more amber wool to look more like the bun.
Next I used Sienna for the meat patty. I did similar size shape. To do felt needling, all you have to do is use the special felt needle (which has more cuts and sharp areas than a regular needle) repeatedly poke the wool (on the foam or sponge board) until the wool is firm. You pierce through the wool at different angles to get different shapes. It takes lots of patience, practice and definitely tons of trial n error.
You use the foam or sponge board to absorb the repeated piercing. Without it, the needles can break easily or you can injure yourself. I also used the leather finger protections because I sometimes hold the piece up. (I did both on this project: broke a needle because I pushed too hard into the wool and at a bad angle, and stabbed my finger because at one point I was being lazy and did not put the leather fingers on.)
Next Accessories! Cheese, Lettuce, tomato. I had made a square shape for the cheese. I believe I made it too big and the lettuce too small but it turned out ok. As I put stacked the pieces together, I could needle the corners of the cheese down to make it look melted.
Still needed a little something so I added a small amount of white wool to make sesame seeds on top. It's all in the details!
Next I added the eyes and a ring on top and Voila! The finished burger!
The fries looked a bit off but I'm happy with the way it turned out. I tried to make the fries individually. I took small pieces of corn-colored wool and rolled them like a stick. Leaving one side more wooly so I could needle that end into the sponge.
I had cut the square sponge into a fry container shape. Wrapped the red around the sponge. Then needled the fries one at a time.
Some afterthoughts:
*If I had thought this out more I probably would have used posterboard for the box. Painted it red and yellow as the posterboard could withstand a paint job more than paper. (My fear was that the paint will make it too heavy and not hold its shape or items inside.) Although if I really thought about it, I probably would opt to use their box and make stuff to fit inside the box.
*I would have made a plushy burger with the pieces stackable and fun pillows instead of this felt charm. This just required more time and planning on my end. I felt like I could do felt needling faster. In totally this project took me about 2 hrs. And a plushy would probably take me all day even if I had all the materials.
*Possibly done a drink squishy or plush to finish the meal. I was not planning to make anything but since he jokingly wanted a happy meal- I obliged.
Guess the joke didn't get too out of hand... Have you ever had a joke get too far? Would love to hear from you.
Was this tutorial detailed enough? Let me know how I can improve them!