Skis and poles for American Girl doll

What you need

• card board big enough to cut 6x strips 18"x1 1/2"(cereal box)
• paper and adhesive laminate or paint, depending on how you want to decorate
• Elmer's glue
• clamps and heavy books
• duck tape in your choice of color for binding and pole handles
• 2 thick wooden skewers or dowels (about 12" long and 3/16" diameter)

How to make the skis

1. From card board cut 6 strips 18" long by 1 1/2" wide

2. Take one strip and round one end in a half circle and transfer to a second strip and cut second
    strip (this will be the basic form of your ski)

3. Glue one of the cut strips on top of two uncut strips (leave the curved tip and about 1" from it
    unglued).
    Weigh down with heavy books. Let glue dry.
    Repeat for other ski

4. Put glue between all layers and bend tip upwards, clamp in the upward position and let glue dry.
    Repeat with other ski.

5. Cut other layers of cardboard to match curved tip

6. Either paint and seal or print a design on paper (merging two papers together to get 18") and
    laminate with self adhesive laminate. (I designed and printed it on the computer, remember you
    need top and bottom)

 

7. If you painted and sealed your skis, you are done. Otherwise continue with this step
    Glue paper on top and bottom of your skis and weigh with heavy books and let dry. 

8. Cut paper along card board edge

Your ski base is done !!!

How to make bindings for your skis

Follow the steps for binding in my snowboard blog

How to make the poles

1. Take 2 skewers and paint them in a matching color and let dry

2. Cut a 3 1/2" piece of duct tape (color of your binding) and cut in half length wise

3. Take one of the halves and fold over 1/3 then fold over the other side.
    Repeat for the other piece of duct tape

4. Cut a 5" piece of duct tape and cut it to a width of 1 1/4"

5. Wrap this 5" piece of duct tape around to top part of the skewer until about 2" are left

6. Take one of the pieces from step 3 and bend it into a circle (seam inside) and tape with a scrap
    piece of duct tape to keep it in shape

7. Go through the circle with the leftover 2" on your skewer. Your loop should be towards the
    non-sticky side, continue wrapping the duct tape around the top part of the skewer and going
    through the loop until all of the duct tape is gone. You have now finished the handle.

8. Repeat steps 4 - 7 for other skewer handle

9. Take a piece of card board ( 1" x 2" ) and cover from both sides with duct tape.

10. Draw 2 circles with a radius of 3/8" and cut out

11. Poke skewer tip through the center of the circle. Glue in place


You are done !!!