Red Write Returning: Ribbon Sculpture Hair Accessories: Frozen's Anna. A Tutorial

Supplies: ⅜" grosgrain ribbon in flesh, royal blue, reddish brown, light blue, black, fushia.

2 ¼" grosgrain ribbon in fushia (to match above)
⅛" skinny reddish brown (to match above)
⅛" skinny yellow grosgrain

(if you want the white streak in anna's hair, get some skinny (⅛") white grosgrain)

You'll want to seal all the exposed edges. You can do this a few different ways:

1. You can cut with scissors and seal with fray check - easy, but fray check can discolor,

2. cut with a wood burning tool (i definitely recommend! see my post here)

3. You can use a candle flame to melt the edges (easy enough on straight edges but you may need LOTS of practice to get even edges on rounded or v shaped cuts)

Start out by measuring one 3" piece for head/body, and one 2 ½" piece for arms in the flesh color.

With the 3" head piece, you'll want to fold over about ½"

add a bit of hot glue to the short piece (above, on top), then fold over again. You might want to practice that second fold; because it's small it can be a little tricky to fold and get the edges to line up. And hot glue doesn't give you second chances...

Now you have your head body piece (I was making two at a time, so that's why there's two shown below!) Make sure you haven't glued down the loop - you want the hole in the middle to give it the round head shape.

Now for your arms.

In the pic above, the arms on the left are not good - pretty jagged and uneven. The arms on the right are much more even and smooth. Ribbon is cheap...make it look nice if you can.

On top of your arm piece, lay a 1 ⅝" piece of light blue (depending on how well you cut your hands, this measurement may vary slightly, check your fit on your arms). You're not going to do anything with this yet, so set it aside.

Now to start on the dress: Cut 4 pieces 4" long. The ends don't need to be sealed.

Glue one piece onto your body piece slight off center. Fold in half and glue to the back.

Add next ribbon slightly off center and overlapping the first. Finish with the last two ribbons on the outside - try to make it look symmetrical.

Anna has a black shirt that just peaks out underneath her cape. You'll want to cut a 1 ¼" piece of black.

Fold it in half and glue it down with the fold facing her head.

For the belt, cut two pieces of the skinny yellow at 1 ½". The ends should be sealed. Glue it on so that it covers the ends of the black and will form a slight V. Fold the other edge around to the back side and glue down. Repeat for other side.

Glue the arms on so that the light blue side faces DOWN.

Now you'll fold the arms down.

They should reach just below the yellow belt.

I used 2" wide pink ribbon for the cape. I thought it was a little too wide for the doll.

So I created a fan fold in the middle of the back. It won't be seen once the hair clip is glued on, so just play with it until you get to a width you are happy with.

On one cape, I cut a slit, about ¼" long and then overlapped and glued. It was easy and worked.

Glue the cap to the back of the doll.

Then fold the edges around towards the front and tack in place.

I didn't buy ⅜" pink for the cape. I just cut the wide one in half using a metal ruler and my woodburning tool to seal the edge. Then round the ends, just like with the hands.

You'll want to check your measurements. The ends of the cape should JUST MEET when they fold over to the front.

Glue it on the back first. Then fold over to the front and glue down. You can add a white or black sequin here to look like a button holding it closed.

I wanted my head to touch the top of the black shirt, so I went ahead at this point and added a small dap of glue to the neck area, and glued the chin down.

The hair on the head is made up of two pieces of ribbon. The first is 1 ⅜" long and one end should be cut at an angle and sealed. You'll glue the angle to the forehead, fold the remaining ribbon to the back of the head and glue down.

The second piece of hair is 1 ½". Start by glueing in the back, fold up around the front of the head and finish in the back. You may want to play with this a bit before glueing.

Once you have it the way you like, you can move the ribbon up, add a small bit of glue to help hold the hair in place.

I thought she looked a bit like a cone head, so i folded more of the ribbon back and glued down.

Braids all one color: cut 3 pieces of skinny brown 4" long.

Adding white to Anna's braid, cut 5 pieces at 4" and one 4" skinny white.

You don't want to deal with ribbon pieces shorter than this...braiding gets complicated.

Braid. Each side will be about an 1 ½".

I finished my ends with some silver thread wrapped several times around the braid then tied off.

Clip the ends so they are even. Glue on the back.

To finish off the clip, cut a piece of coordinating ribbon about 4.5" long. seal the ends. Put glue sparingly on about 1" of the ribbon. Working quickly, open the clip and position the ribbon along the inside of the clip, smooshing it flat. Add a bit of glue to the back on the clip, fold ribbon in half and smooth flat against the clip and sealing to the other part of the ribbon.

Fold the ribbon around to the other half of the clip and trim. I leave the other prong of the clip exposed so that it doesn't get tangled in the hair. Seal the end and glue down.

Position the clip to the back of your Anna Hair Ribbon Doll and glue down.

Congratulations, you're finished!!