Shadow Framed Lalaloopsy Tinies

When you were a kid, you ever collected those tiny blind toys, capsule toys, or Lego figurines?
You displays them but eventually you put them in the box and leave them in the closet and never go back to them?

For my case I actually threw away majority of my collection when I move out of my parent's house. Which was big mistake, I now own a house and there's PLENTY of walls now that I can display them! I had these capsule toys of diecast Pokemon figurines, and my favorite selected Lion King Pogs, that I totally could of use this idea to display them.....




Lalaloopsy is a toy that I would of loved if I was a kid. These rag dolls were plastic toys but detailed as if they are stitiched on fabric dolls. It wasn't that popular assuming they are slowly fading away.




The actual dolls are huge space taking toy so I've decided to collect these Tinies as compromise. Putting them in a shadow box would look nice so I collected them at certain degree.




These Loopsy Tinies have holes from top to bottom that you can thread through with strings. So I threaded each one and tied a knot on the back side of the paper to let them float on the paper.



Materials:
- Ikea shadow frame: 50cmx50cm
- Collection of Lalaloopsy toys
- Scissors
- Mono strings(for jewellery or fishing line)
- Rubber cement glue
- Black multi-purpose art paper
- Double-side tape(opitional)
- White pencil for marking
- Scrap card stock paper
Step 1: 
Pull out the paper from Ikea's shadow box and trace the paper size on black paper.

Cut the paper following the mark.




Step 2: 
Decide how to you want to display them.
I decided to follow the color of the rainbow. I did discard some Loopsy because there were more pinks than other colors.




Step3:
On the back side of the black paper, decide where you want to place these Loopsy.

Things to consider:
- Border around the frame. I had about 1'' border around it.
- How many rows and column you want within the frame. I did 9x9 so 81 Loopsy in total.




Step 4:
Toys might get heavy so it might be safe to have reinforcement by using scrap card stock paper(See Step 6).

With piece of card stock glue on the intersection of the grid.




Step 5:
When glue is dry, pierce 2 holes where the thread will thread through in next step. 2 holes are about Loopsy height apart from each other.

Do it for all 91.




Step 6: 
With a string about 15-20cm length, thread loopsy and thread through the 2 holes you pierced.
Flip the paper on the back side and tie few knots.

The piece of card stock you glued earlier will help strengthen the thread through 2 holes.




This is how it looks like from the front:




Then back.








Step 7:
The paper did get heavier and I was worried it might collapse when I frame it so for extra secure, I used the mount board that came with the frame to hold up the paper better.

Use double sided tape or glue the edges around the mount board. Then place the paper on top of the mount board and press down.




Step 8:
Now it's ready to frame.
Make sure the glass from the inside is dust free before you mount the Loopsy display.




As optional step, I put the Loopsy check list(that same with the toy) inside the frame as memorabilia. Most of the time when toys comes with stickers or cards I never know what to do with them and it ends up being in the garbage or put into boxes just to "save" it.








To all kids, you should keep your collection until you find a way to display them. Those Tsum Tsum, Shopkins, My Little Pony, Pets Shops Blind toys are adorable to display! These aren't cheap, you should really hold them until someday you own a home that you can decorate with.

This will be dust free, and it makes the toys look fancy. Give it a try!