If you’ve been following me for awhile, you may remember seeing this little chipmunk in my large-scale paper sculpture installation. He was a part of the scene, sitting on the porch in the Victorian Country Garden scene.

To make this little chipmunk, I read up on the type of things chipmunks like to eat and where they live. I’ve seen chipmunks in our backyard scurrying back and forth as fast as can be.

Whenever I’ve seen a chipmunk in my yard or out on a hike, they are always scurrying around on the ground over the tree roots and rocks. Chipmunks stay close to the ground, unlike squirrels that are constantly running up and down the tress. They like to dig tunnels and burrows underground or make their home inside a log.

Chipmunks are also so quick, busily collecting their foods. I was curious to find out what type of foods chipmunks eat. I knew they like nuts and seeds, but what else do they enjoy eating? After a little research, I learned chipmunks like to eat their veggies, such as dandelions, as well as grains, berries, sunflower seeds, insects, and nuts, to name just a few. It sounds like chipmunks are not very picky eaters.

In the fall, as the weather gets colder, they start to stash away food for the winter months. As they are collecting foods, they store it in those chubby cheeks they are so famous for. Did you know that chipmunks can hold up to 12 acorns in the pouches of their mouth? That’s a lot of acorns! When I read that chipmunks can stuff all those acorns in their mouth, I knew I had to have this paper sculpture chipmunk holding an acorn, with his puffy cheeks full of others just out of sight.

Sketching up the chipmunk holding an acorn was my next step in the artistic process. That is one of the nice things about researching the animals. Sometimes it will spark an idea for the layout or composition of your piece, like their surrounding and what they’re doing.

Next, I started paper sculpting. To create the chipmunk’s body, I started by paper-sculpting a form before adding thousands of thinly cut pieces of paper fur to the chipmunk’s paper body. Then I painted the paper fur, including the white with brownish-black striped fur down the chipmunk’s back. I also hand-sculpted his acorn out of paper and finished its coloring with watercolor and gouache paint.

I wanted this chipmunk to be a part of my large-scale installation at the Paper Works show last year at the Mansion at Strathmore in Bethesda, Maryland. For the show, I had him sitting on a chair, holding one acorn with another acorn sitting alongside of him, as though he is busy collecting acorns. Even though chipmunks typically stay close to the ground, I took a little artistic license by putting him on the paper wicker chair in the installation so he would be visible.

I am really happy with how the little chipmunk turned out. After the show, the individual flowers and animals that I created for the paper sculpture installation are now sold as separate pieces of art. Now it is time to give this “Happy Camper” a home of his own. I searched for a glass dome that he could sit inside of so that I could create his own little environment. I added extra acorns, logs and rocks — all made out of paper and paint. To keep him secure in his new home, I mounted him to a wood base.

“Happy Camper” just seemed like a perfect name for this little chipmunk, who is so happy to find some acorns outside in the gardens, collecting his “groceries” to store over the winter!