crepe paper

A butterfly breezes by, four feet tall, a leggy little flower comes along next, followed by a plump tomato. Apparitions like these aren’t so surprising at a children’s costume party, but there is something unusual about these particular creatures: They owe their disguises to crepe paper. What else but magic can explain a paper capable of such transformations? Paper you can stretch, twist, or curl into shape using just your fingers? Paper you can sew and even wear? It's not so mysterious: All crepe paper starts out as tissue paper, which is sized and then creped, a process that involves dragging the tissue across a series of knives, drawing it into the tiny gathers that make crepe paper what it is. Because of its incredible give, you can manipulate it in ways that would cause plain tissue to tear. Plus, crepe is inexpensive and available in a rainbow of colors, usually in twenty-by-ninety-inch pieces.The best way to discover crepe paper’s capabilities is to experiment with a piece. Pull it with the grain, and nothing happens, but a tug in the other direction yields a curve. Stretch out the edge for a ruffled effect. If you roll a piece and twist it tightly, it stays put. You can glue it, tie it, even iron it (dry-iron only—colors bleed when wet).