Tips for quilling snowflakes that I wish I'd known sooner

I mostly do snowflakes as ornaments for the tree each winter, and the wax paper trick is the only reason mine come out symmetrical at all. I trace my pattern in pencil on plain paper first, tape the wax paper over it, and the pencil lines show through just enough to line everything up. Before I started doing that I made one with five points and one with seven on the same flake and nearly gave up on the hobby entirely. Something that helped me more than I expected was a circle sizer board. I fought with getting coils the same size by eyeballing them for years, and it turns out I was just bad at it. Now every loose coil gets dropped into the same circle before I glue the end and my arms actually match. Mine came in a little quilling starter kit years ago but I think they sell the boards separately too. For glue I use a bottle with a fine tip, the kind sold for card making, and I put a tiny bit on a toothpick instead of dipping anything. When the flake is fully dry I give the whole thing a brush of matte sealant on both sides so it survives being handled and packed away in a box with the rest of the ornaments. That last step stopped the arms popping off mid-December, which used to happen every single year.

Hi all, first post here so sorry if this is a dumb one. I mostly make paper cards and tried quilling a couple times for a wedding card and gave up because my coils kept unfurling overnight before I even got to glue anything. Is that a humidity thing or am I rolling too loose? Also curious what width strips people start with, mine always felt too wide for the little tight coils. The cramping tip hits home though, my fingers were sore for days after that card. Might give it another go now that it's the season for it.

One habit I picked up along the way is labeling each arm position on the pattern sheet, 1 through 6, and drying every arm flat before assembly, because even arms that look identical have tiny differences in coil tension and you can rotate them til the imbalance sits where it is least visible. Slightly pedantic, I know, but it works. I also use fine tweezers for placement since fingers always seem to smear glue onto the paper no matter how careful I am. Does anyone else find that rolling the strip with the colored side facing inward versus outward changes the finished look? I have gone back and forth on which I prefer for the tight centers.

That bit about the circle sizer board is so true, I did the same thing for ages. I ended up making my own out of a piece of thin plastic from a takeout lid, just punched a few holes of diferent sizes in it with a craft knife and it does the exact same job as the bought ones. Cheap and it lives in my quilling tin now. I found letting the coil relax a second before dropping it in helps too, it settles into its true size instead of the size it was while still tight on the tool.

Update: tried the takeout lid sizer trick and it works great, though punching the holes cleanly took two lids. Also the humidity question from the card maker, yes, damp air makes coils relax, I roll tighter and glue sooner in winter. Tried the numbering arms idea too, the rotation trick really hides uneven coils.