Paper Petals, Part 2

Tuesday we looked at two ways to make roses from a single length of ribbon or paper. Today we’re going to go strictly paper and add a few more steps. But look at the results!

Paper Roses

A reminder of the supply list from the last post:

• Paper
• Scissors or craft punches
• Bobby Pin
• Glue

I found this kit on clearance at Marshall’s a couple of weeks ago to make a gorgeous crepe paper bouquet (it’s also from Martha Stewart, by the way). I opened the kit, preparing to be amazed at some complex project at hand. Do you know the big secret?

Hearts.

Yup. The petals are all hearts, which if you think about it, makes perfect sense. Petals are sort of teardrop shapes, two together make a heart. So, while, sure, having a kit is great, you can totally do this without even paying $5 for this kit (much less the $10 they originally wanted for it). And, since we’re dealing with basic shapes, here, I don’t think I’m really giving away any trade secrets, you know?

Start with the Hearts	Start with a bunch of heart shapes. If you’ve got a craft punch this would be a great use for it, otherwise trace and cut with scissors or just freehand some. I’ll bet they’ll look even more realistic if hand-cut as opposed to identical pieces. Still, if you don’t trust yourself to cut without a net, go for the uniform, it’s okay.
For each of the hearts you want to curl the curved edges a bit. You can use a skewer or whatever but I found that a bobby pin (used similar to a quilling tool) makes this step SO simple: slide the bobby pin over the tip of the heart/petal, roll away from you, slide it out–it’s like a curling iron for paper. Do this to all of your hearts and then start assembling them.	Curling the Petals
A Bud from a Single Heart	The first heart creates the bud and will wrap around itself a couple of times to make a tight center. If you want to have stems for these flowers, wrap this first petal around a pipe cleaner or piece of wire. Dab a little glue on the last flap to fold over and press to secure.
Add more hearts by overlapping the edge of the previous one and continuing to wrap in the same direction until you run out of hearts or your rose is the size you want. A small rosebud will look very nice with only 3 hearts. The fuller flowers used 15 hearts each.	Paper Rose--15 petals

Experiment with different types of paper–I’ve used some shiny tissue paper, banana paper as well as some gorgeous handmade paper from the local art store to make the roses in the opening picture. The handmade paper is my favorite–it looks so much heavier and full, even in that bright turquoise.

Wired, they’d make a lovely arrangement or package tie or could be added to a headband or hair clip. Make enough of them and cover a wreath form (attach with hot glue) for a centerpiece or door hanging (just keep it out of the weather).

Want one more way to while away an afternoon making very cute things out of paper and not much else? Check out this Origami Paper Roses Tutorial from Housewife Eclectic. They could also pass for tulips, too!

How many roses will you make, today?

Paper Petals, Part 1

Picture this. You’re in the mood to make something floral but there’s a few impediments to your creative zen:

• You possess neither a green thumb nor a neighbor’s garden from which to pilfer.
• Your craft room comes up shy in the silk flower department.
• It’s way too late to go to the craft store (or you don’t want to spend a lot of money or just don’t want to get dressed to go out–I know, I’ve been there).

What do you do?

Do you have

• Papers or ribbons?
• Scissors or craft punches?
• Glue or tape?
• A bobby pin (optional, but helpful)?

Why, then, you can make your own flowers! And who knows, you might find making them more fun than your original idea.

Ribbon Roses 1

All you need for these first two techniques is some 1-inch ribbon (fabric or paper) and scissors. Needle and thread wouldn’t hurt but it’s not absolutely required just yet.

Several years ago, probably more like over a decade, I learned how to make ribbon roses thanks to an episode of Martha Stewart’s show. (I was in my Martha phase, then. But after seeing her do a kitchen segment with dirt under her nails my enthusiasm began to seriously wane. That many people around, a camera close-upping on your hands, and you don’t think it’s important to clean up a bit? tsk tsk)

I had brought work home with me, including my adding machine, and had scads of used adding machine tape, so practiced with that. Turns out, adding machine tape makes spectacular practice ribbon! Those roses lasted ages, sitting on the front counter at the office, and I’ve never forgotten the technique.

It’s a series of 4 simple folds, each a 90-degree angle and leaving a little space between the corners creates a hole in the center of the square. For paper you can crease the folds and make life easier on yourself, the same with wired ribbon. Non-wired (aka floppy) ribbon just has to be handled a bit more carefully. The pins in the below pictures are just to leave my hands free to work the camera, once you get the hang of it you’ll be able to whip through these flowers with just your fingers in no time flat.

Ribbon Roses, Steps 1-4

When you reach the end of your ribbon (or you think you’ve folded enough–better to err on the side of extra folds and unravel some at the back of an over-full flower than not have enough), thread the end of the ribbon through the small hole in the center (this is the one part that’s easier with ribbon than paper), and twist the ribbon as you pull to create the center bud. Continue to twist more than you pull, rotating the petals around the center bud, creating that offset look that makes it look more flower-like, less square. Tie off the tails at the base of the flower and then arrange the petals the way you want them.

Ribbon Roses, Steps 5-8

You can also play with the angle of the folds for different finished flower effects.

4, 5 and 6-fold Ribbon Roses

As you can see, I’ve tacked them to this yoga block (not like it was being used for anything else) with a pearl-headed corsage pin. For more permanent use and any sort of application where they’re going to get a fair amount of moving around (clothing or accessories), take a needle and matching thread to secure the layers of petals, hiding the stitches among the folds.

The 4-fold rose likes to return to it’s squarish roots while the 5-point (fold into a pentagram, 5 72-degree angles for the precision-minded) looks the most rose-like to me. The 6-fold rose (hexagram or 6 60-degree angles) is pretty, yes, but even I had to start over a couple of times and finally placed it on the yoga block so I could fold with one hand and hold down with the other–rotating with each turn was not working. It is pretty, though.

But that’s not the only way to fold a flower.

Ribbon Roses 2

Going back to our garland knot-guru, Nimibirla, here’s another way of forming delicate ribbon roses for any number of uses.

You can certainly make these flowers with only one ribbon, but the two together are not only beautiful, they make the technique easier to see. If you’re only using one ribbon you may not need to stitch as many times as she shows.

Come back Thursday for the third way to make your house bloom with little to no cost and no green thumb needed.

Are you reaching for your ribbon, yet?

3 Ways to Flower Power It Up!

As much as I love to DIY a project, I don’t believe in constantly reinventing the wheel.

With that in mind, we’re going to look at some other ways of assembling garlands that some talented folks have made available by the wonders of the webbernets:

Garland Knot

As I understand it, garland making is a frequent (perhaps daily!) occurrence in India. I’ve seen pictures of the flower markets in the larger cities and they are magnificent with colorful blooms. The flowers are used in all manner of ceremonies and decorations, so many nimble fingers tie the blossoms into both simple and ornate garlands. This garland knot–which looks and feels like a figure-8 with a twist–secures the flowers and solves one of my main wonders:

How do you keep the flowers all lined up and nice when they’re so imbalanced?

Answer: You place them in pairs so that they DO balance! Brilliant.

Wired Bundles

Another way to create swag-like garlands (and, no, I don’t mean swag as in Stuff We All Get goodies) is to wrap, with wire, twine or string, small bundles or stems onto a form or framework of some sort. This could be a grapevine wreath or a carved piece of Styrofoam covered in moss or greenery–even cardboard if you were intent on up-cycling some boxes or packing materials!

(The wrapping demonstration starts around 2:00)

Braiding

If you have long, supple stems you can also braid them together as-is or interspersed with ribbon. If you can do a simple 3-strand braid you can make this sort of garland, but if you’d like some visuals, check out the Braided Princess Crown at Instructables.

arts 14 and 15: Flower Fun!

This sort of feels like cheating, only the next two arts truly go hand in hand and use a lot of the same techniques, so I’m going to combine them in the interest of not repeating myself unnecessarily as well as getting the most bang for our creative buck! (And who’s really going to argue with that?)

We already discussed flower arranging in the 7th Art: Flower Bouquets, this art has to do with more decorative applications both for the body and the home.

14: Garland making
Strung without their leaves, to venerate the gods or decorate the house.

15: Crowns and head ornaments
Headbands or circlets of flowers of all colors, used especially by townspeople.

See? Interrelated. Lots of flowers on the list, but, as with arts past, we’re not going to be bound too closely by the descriptions above. There will be fabrics and sewing, some beads and wire and paper fun if all goes well.

But we’ll start with the flowers because it’s as good as anywhere!

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Basic Garland Making

Fairy Fest Garland

This garland is actually left over from last year’s Midsummer Fairy Fest–they surrounded the Mason Jar Centerpieces–but could easily be worn as a circlet or headband. (Instructions for the centerpieces and the garland can be found in the eHow article linked to the name, there.)

The first garlands this art mentions, though, specify no leaves and are created in the same way that Hawaiian leis are–it’s simple stringing. You can use fresh flowers if you’ve got them available but I’m going to use silk ones and make a bracelet for the sake of time.

What You’ll Need:

Fresh or Silk flowers, heads only, stems and leaves removed (lots)
Needle and Thread

Really, that’s it.

Needle, ribbon and silf flower heads.

01: Measure the length of your intended garland, add an inch or two for knotting and double the total.

02: Thread your needle with the thread and knot the two ends together.

Since I’m making a bracelet with silk flowers, I’m using a tapestry needle and some 1/8-inch ribbon but for fresh flowers you’re probably going to want a regular sewing needle (a long one) and regular sewing thread. Some sources suggest mono-filament but it’s slippery and can sometimes be difficult to knot. Cotton or poly-blend will be perfectly fine for this.

03: Divide your flower heads in half. We’ll be stringing each half in an opposite direction.

Stringing the first half of the flowers.

04: Starting with one half of the flowers, thread the needle through each flower-head from the top down through the middle, towards where the stem would have been. Slide the first flower down to the end of the thread (or as close as you plan to have them if you’re going to have streamers trailing) and snug each following flower up next to the previous one.

Another benefit to silk flowers is that most have a little plastic bit in the center for the stamens–use this! It’ll keep your flowers separated just enough to be fluffy without being loose. If you want the same effect using fresh flowers, snip small sections of straws and use them as spacers between each flower.

Stringing the second half of the flowers.

05: Once you’ve strung the first half of your flowers, thread the needle through the remaining half from the opposite direction (from stem to stamen) until your desired length is achieved.

06: Knot each end with a pair of butcher’s knots to secure the flowers and then finish based on your purpose. For a lei or circlet, tie the two ends together flush with each other. For my bracelet I tied on a pair of clasps and left the rest of the ribbon loose. This would be a great time to pull out the ribbon tips I used in the drawstring bag project and attached a little drop bead or two.

The finished bracelet is cute but it is a bit of a statement piece–folks are going to notice it–so keep that in mind if you make one for yourself. Ribbons tied and left streaming from various points of the garland would be cute, adding spacer beads would work, too. This could easily be converted to a necklace by attaching a chain (metal or crocheted ribbon) to each end and maybe adding a large-bailed pendant to the center.

The finished garland bracelet.

For a home decoration, use flowers of various sizes or string multiple strands, each a little longer than the previous one, and knot the matching ends to a ring or loop. The loop can then be hooked onto hooks on a wall–even used as curtain tie-backs!

What other uses can you think of for this sort of garland?

Catching Up: Arts 8-13

Part 2 of our chronicling the arts, feel free to jump into whatever looks interesting!

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08: Dyes and Colorants for the Body and the Teeth
You know where this leads: Make Up! and girlie fun for 5 posts.
Browse the aisles or head straight over to my reviews in A Good Foundation.

09: Mosaics
Playing with Mosaics was so much fun I did two projects over 6 posts.
The end result was my mixed media piece, Broken Ties.

10: Bed Arrangement
Here we traveled through home decor, feng shui and creative living for 6 posts starting with the basics of Bed Arrangement.
If you only have time for a nap, make sure to check out my Interview with a Do-Gooder: Bed Days.

11: Musical Instrument Made of Bowls Filled With Water
Have you ever played the Water Glasses? I tried my hand at making it work and we heard a bevy of beautiful performances over the 6 posts.
My own experience with the glasses can be heard in my Pruney Fingers Performance–it’s quite okay to laugh (encouraged, even!).

12: Water-Spewing Games
At first I had a bit of an issue with Water-Spewing Games but I found my groove in memories of summers past in a three-part series.
Jonesing for some water-balloon fun? Check out Water Wars, Part 2 for tips on hosting an epic balloon-battle.

13: The Use of Charms, Drugs, Magic Words
This one was a loaded subject but one I was so looking forward to, mainly because it gave us a chance to examine the ideas conjured by Charms, Drugs & Magic Words over 8 posts.
Need a little break from the day-to-day crazies? Find out how to get it with a peek into Deep Breaths and Shallow Thoughts.

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And that brings us up-to-date on the Arts so far. Did you find a post you missed the first time through? Maybe have a favorite that I didn’t mention here? Let me know in the comments!

Oh! And if you’re interested in hearing some fun music with a travel theme, head on over to my podcast, Random Acts Radio, and check out the newest episode: On the Road.