Klutz Paper Fashions Fantasy Review and Giveaway

FIVE lucky winners will each receive a copy of Klutz's latest craft book, Paper Fashions Fantasy!  To find out how to enter, keep on reading...

When I was a kid, I loved to draw.  I loved drawing girls and flowers and horses and unicorns and fairies and anything else that popped into my imagination.  I have many happy childhood memories of drawing, and I'm happy to see that it looks like The Pea is following in my footsteps.  She spends hours and hours putting the fantasies in her head onto paper -- flower fairies playing in the forest, rainbow girls, mermaids under the sea, gumdrop girls in candyland.   Just like me, she loves to draw beautiful fancy dresses for all the girls that she draws.  So when I was invited to review Klutz's new Paper Fashions Fantasy craft book, I immediately said yes.  The Pea loves Klutz books and she loves drawing clothes, so I knew she would love it.  I just didn't know how much.....

The Basics
As with Klutz's other Paper Fashions books, girls can use the ideas and materials in Paper Fashions Fantasy to easily create amazing paper clothes.  This book is special because the style is fantasy -- girls create clothes for different kinds of fantasy creatures like mermaids, princesses, fairies, goddesses, even witches.  The book contains plastic stencils so kids can trace perfectly proportioned skirts, bodices, sleeves, gloves, capes, hats, and more.  They trace their designs onto paper, cut them out, mix and match pieces together, and glue on embellishments.

Here's what Klutz has to say about their new book:
In the Klutz paper fashions tradition, this book comes with everything girls need to design an entire one-of-a-kind wardrobe, including irresistibly tiny hangers to finish the fashions in style. Unique to this book, though, are fashions that are the stuff of fantasy: goddess gowns, pretty princess dresses, fairy finery, and more. Specially designed papers and stencils make it simple to create everything from flowing cloaks and twinkling tiaras to mermaid tails and fairy wings. And we've even added glitter to the glue — a simple way to sparkle up any fashion.

The Bongga
When I first saw the book, I wanted to keep it all to myself.  Seriously.  The papers are so pretty that I wanted to frame the whole thing and keep it forever and ever.  But The Pea beat me to it, and she and her cousins were soon hard at work designing their fantasy outfits.  Even 3Po and Jammy got in on the fun (maybe they'll grow up to be Tim Gunn; no, they were designing fantasy gowns so maybe they're following in Christian Lacroix's footsteps).  There were more than enough stencils and materials to keep five kids busy at the same time, and BOY did they have fun!  And their outfits turned out so beautiful.  You wouldn't think these young kids could come up with such lovely paper dresses, but I think they did a great job.  The book even includes tiny metal hangers to hang your creations in!   Sooooo cute!

(I'm happy to say that I did get a chance to make an outfit of my own.  I waited till they were asleep, ignored Alfie's teasing about overgrown babies and other childish taunts, and had some fun of my own.  Ha.  So there, Pea, mama did get to try the book out after all.  However my outfit was not up to my standards so I'll have to find another night to make a better outfit.  Not that I'm addicted to Paper Fashions or anything.  But stay tuned for my fab fantasy dress in a future post).

The book itself is as high-quality as all of Klutz's books.  The book includes enough materials (paper, glitter, beads, ribbons, sequins, glitter glue) to make a ton of paper dresses, but you can use the book long after they run out.  There are step-by-step instructions that clearly explain how to trace and cut and paste and embellish.  Each page contains a ton of illustrations, photos, ideas and suggestions to make sure that your child will never run out of inspiration.  I particularly loved the photos of real-life models strutting across the runway in real-life haute couture dresses designed in all the fantasy styles.  You wouldn't think that these fantasy fashions actually appear in real life, but the proof is there, in all its gorgeous glory.

The Blah
As with most of these craft books, I have a hard time keeping all the parts and materials together!  The plastic flap in front snaps open and closed, but I'd have preferred a zippered pouch -- and the sleeve for the papers really needs to be a bit larger in order to fit all the stencils as well as the papers.  It would also be great to have a flap that snaps shut in order to make sure that the little scraps of paper don't fall to the floor. 

The Bottom Line
Klutz Paper Fashions Fantasy is a dream come true for any girl who loves to design beautiful clothes!  It's a wonderful way to occupy their time -- at home, on a playdate, or while traveling (just remember to pack a ziplock bag to store materials and creations).  Parents will love the way this book exercises their daughter's creativity and sparks her imagination!

Win It!
Klutz has generously offered to give FIVE copies of this book away!  Yes, you heard it, FIVE lucky Bonggamom Finds readers will each receive a copy of Klutz Paper Fashions Fantasy.  To enter, simply visit the Klutz website, then come back here and tell me which other Klutz books would catch your child's fancy (this is the required entry and must be completed for any extra entries to count!).  For extra entries, you can do any or all of the following (please leave a separate comment for each extra entry):


1) Sign up to be a Klutz Insider and leave a comment here telling me the email address you used to sign up.

2) Fave Bonggamom Finds on Technorati (leave a comment with your Technorati id).

3) Fave Finding Bonggamom on Technorati (leave a comment with your Technorati id).

4) Follow Finding Bonggamom on Blogger (leave a comment with your Blogger profile name).

5) Follow Bonggamom Finds on Blogger(leave a comment with your Blogger profile name).

6) Tweet this giveaway (leave a comment with a link to your tweet). Here is a sample tweet you can copy and paste:

Win a Klutz Paper Fashions Fantasy book from @bonggafinds!  http://tinyurl.com/magky6
 
This giveaway ends at midnight PST on September 17, 2009.; I will draw five winners at random on September 18 and post their names in the comments section soon after. For additional giveaway rules, click here. Good luck!


I received a product sample for this post, but no monetary compensation. The views and opinions expressed here are my own.