Pipe Cleaner Owl (chenille stems) Step by Step Instructions with pictures – 15 step 3 Hour Intermediate Project

Pipe cleaner (chenille stem) owl

Start by creating 1 small oval and 3 circles. The oval will be for the bottom of the owl where the legs will come out, and the three circles will be for the general outline of the middle of the body, top of the body, and the middle of the head. The largest circle should be around 2 inches in diameter.
Connect the oval to the middle circle and the top circle with the first two parallel to each other and the top circle slightly tilted.
Add the last circle for the head parallel to the top circle and add two pipes to the top to round it out.
To make the legs, take 4 yellow pipe cleaners and cut them in half. Bend each of these 8 pipes in half and tie them tightly near the pointed ends.
Bend the round ends to make 4 little toes and coil a single pipe cleaner from the ankles up to the first tie that kept them all together.
Use a brown pipe cleaner to tie the two feet together, leaving a little bit of space between them. Use a figure 8 pattern when tying to achieve this result.
Put the legs through the oval, titled such that they are parallel with the back of the body. Add a pipe cleaner around the legs and the back of the frame to keep the legs in place.
Start filling in the coloring of the body by adding pipes bottom to top. Do not weave back and forth, use a single pipe for each iteration. It is ok to leave a small opening in back because it will be covered up later on, and it can be useful to have this opening as an access point until it is covered up.
Add to the frame of the head to create a larger oval shape that is perpendicular to the legs. The owl’s head is going to be facing to the right.
Create the eyes by taking a yellow pipe cleaner and making a small circle at the end, leaving a long length of pipe perpendicular for use later in anchoring them. Make a smaller black circle (this time without a hole) that has the same design and wrap a length of it around the yellow anchor piece.
Attach the eye by attaching the anchor to the frame at the back of the head.
Make a small nose by bending a small length of pipe cleaner in half and then bending the rounded end to a 60 degree angle. Pinch tightly then spread it back out a tiny bit. Attach to the back of the head, sticking out slightly further in the front of the face than the eyes.
Add some black pipes in a rounded pattern around the eyes and beak until the entire face is filled in. Fill in the back of head only after the face has been completed.
Create the tail feather by creating a zig zag pattern wth two arms. Create another three of these, progressively smaller and narrower that will go on top of the first one. This will have the effect of giving the tail feather a feathered look.
Attach the tail feathers in order to the back of the body, one at a time.