Valentine Threat? No Sweat! (2009 Edition)

It’s that time of the year again, when everything seems to be nauseatingly happy and annoyingly pink. While a lot of guys out there have learnt the hard way and have purchased expensive gifts for the special one’s in their lives (suckers!), there are still the occasional clueless ones who don’t realize till the last minute, the expectation upon them on this very biased day.

A couple of years back we came up with a quick and cheap gift idea for a last minute Valentine fix, but not everyone was fortunate enough to get positive results out of that. So we decided to up the ante and come up with a last minute solution that will take a bit of effort (not too much though), and be a lot more appreciated from members of the fairer sex.

So this year, it starts like every other — our protagonist realizes that it’s Valentine’s day and he’s forgotten to get a gift for his girlfriend.

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The reason you see the dread on his face is because the last time he forgot an occasion, the consequences were not that pleasant (as clearly seen below). This year a gift is a must, and it can’t be something lazy like a card or chocolates. The gift has to mean something, and it must be personalized.

Luckily, our protagonist discovers this article on Tech 2.0 in time and get’s an idea that may actually get him off the hook. Yes, we are that awesome!

Our simple, yet effective solution to you comes from papercraft — a skill you probably learnt in school but forgot over the years in pursuit of other things in life. Well, it’s time to get your cutting and folding skills in place, because you’re gonna need it.

For this story, we pick out a Valentine day special papercraft developed by the brilliant artists at Cubeecraft.com.

Of course you have the freedom to select any other papercraft that may tickle your fancy (we have a good list of sites you can get them from on the last page), but for this example, our protagonist feels that the Val-09 papercraft would be apt. Click on the screenshot above to download the template.
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The first thing you need to do is print the template. If you have an easily accessible printer in your office, go for it. Or you can sneak a printout from the shared office printer when everyone’s out on lunch break. Just make sure that the printout is in color, and on good quality paper (photo paper recommended).

Luckily Val-09 doesn’t need any kind of adhesive to be put together, so loverboy here can get the job done by just some skillful cutter and scissor work.

There! Just an hour of cutting and joining, and Val-09 is ready to use!

A job well done for our guy here, and for you, if you’re planning on following this awesome guide to a great Valentine day.

For those who’ve bought ludicrously expensive gifts for their Valentines, don’t you wish you had done this instead?

Be sure to check out the next page for more awesome papercraft sites.
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You can find some awesome papercraft templates to keep you busy for hours on the following sites.

Cubeecraft

Not only did these guys just help save your valentine, but they also have a huge collection of pop-culture inspired cube-models. A great place to visit for fun papercraft models that don’t need any adhesive.

Readymech

These papertoys are simple to build and make great desktop decorations. The best place to start for newbies.

The World of Speakerdog!

This very unique and very original site has a great collection of papercraft toys that go beyond simply being cute.

100 Exceptional Free Paper Models and Toys

This blog entry is exactly what the title says. The paper models featured on this list, range from easy to fanatically difficult, but they’re all pretty amazing.

Papercraft World

If you like papercraft then this blog should definitely be in your bookmarks. These guys keep their blog updated with all the new papercraft releases.