A good friend and very special person to me recently commented that she loved the blue tit papercuts I had been working on. They were not intended for any particular project and I hadn’t yet worked out what, if anything, I could do with them. A natural first idea is often to turn small cut figures into greetings card toppers, but I thought I’d have a go at framing one instead.

I recently made a bit of 3D wall art for the home and used an Ikea RIBBA box frame to hold the finished piece, and thought another would work well for the blue tit picture. I decided that the happy little round bird should be sat on a branch, and that there should be some blossom and spring leaves to signify growth and hope.

For the branch I considered a selection of possible windfall sticks collected from the garden (toddlers are the greatest stick collectors of all) and chose the handsomest stick of those that found. I drew up a few simple blossom and leaf shapes in illustrator and put score lines on them so I could give them a bit of added dimension with a few well-placed creases, and arranged the elements in the frame with a gentle watercolour background.

I really love this simple arrangement, and the mixture of materials, and I thought this tiny bird had found his perfect spot to sing. Unfortunately his perch broke a little whilst he was migrating south (perhaps due to the uncommonly dry spell of weather that we have been having in the UK and the stick I had chosen being too dry and brittle) so I am taking a lot of advice on where to find sustainable sticks without damaging trees, as I don’t want to remove living bits of tree, and using ‘green’ wood sticks, and various, more flexible alternative wood sticks. I may try this again in a few weeks and send a friend on the same journey to see if another birdy might have a better journey.