Paper Poinsettia Ornaments

The boys and I have Christmas fever. We can barely focus on our school work these days. Luckily, I had planned out this Christmas ornament craft ahead of time. We make homemade Christmas tree ornaments every year - usually out of scrapbook paper. This year we're making these gorgeous Paper Poinsettia Ornaments, both for our tree and to give away as gifts. The boys are so excited to give them out, and working on them a little each day is scratching that Christmas itch - along with copious amounts of Christmas music and the eating of many a Christmas cookie. 😊

Our Paper Poinsettia Ornaments turned out fabulous!

We mixed and matched different shades and patterns of red paper to really make the ornaments pop.




Here's what you'll need:
several sheets of various red colored and patterned paper (one scrapbook sized page will make about 2 flowers)
a printer
a pencil for tracing (see note below template)
sissors
a glue stick
red and/or yellow pipe cleaners (1 per flower)
red curling or mylar ribbon (6 to 8 inches per flower)
glue gun (optional)

Start by printing and cutting the template below. Trace the cutouts onto the back of your pretty red paper and cut 'em all out. Each poinsettia will require 6 large petals, 5 to 6 small petals, and one circular base.

For each petal, cut an inch up from the bottom, put a generous amount of glue on the back of one end and glue it over the other end to create a pucker at the bottom. Hold that pucker closed for several seconds to secure while also bending the petal back at the middle. Poinsettias are an open flower and you'll want the petals to tilt out instead of in. Allow the petals to dry.




To the base, glue a six inch piece of curling ribbon to make a loop for hanging. Let dry.

If you have smaller children, you'll want to do this preliminary glue prep for the petals and bases beforehand. It's a little tedious.




To prep the center of the flower, cut a pipe cleaner in half and then in half again to get 4 equal pieces. Curl in the ends of each piece. Then, twist all four pieces together at the middle and separate out the little tendrils.




To put the flowers together (this is the fun part), glue the large petals, one at a time, onto the ribbon side of the base overlapping them a little as you go.




Now glue the smaller petals in the center, also, overlapping them a little as you go.




Glue a pipe cleaner center smack dab in the middle. This is where you may want to use a glue gun if you have one. Pipe cleaners need a lot of glue to stay secure.

These paper Poinsettia Ornaments turned our little fake Christmas tree (we call it our "humble" tree) into something spectacular. Aren't they just gorgeous on the tree?

Here's that template:




Note: If you're using 8 1/2 x 11 inch colored paper, you can load the paper right into your printer, making sure to print the template on the back side, and then cut out the petals for use. No tracing! If you're using scrapbook sized paper, you'll need to print out the template (card stock is best) and cut out 1 large petal, 1 small petal, and the base to use for tracing.

Happy Christmas crafting!

Summer Fun: Flower Power Wreath

Looking for something to keep the kiddos busy? This wreath is totally kid friendly, but feel free to hog this one if you need some mommy creative space. 😉

My door was without adornment since the wind had turned my Usnea wreath into a wonky mess. Plus, the boys were jonesin for a project, so I had them try their hand at the paper flowers I used for my Easter garland this past spring. I pulled the scraggly Usnea off of my wreath base and the boys and I re-did the wreath with our handmade flowers.



The boys did a great job with this craft and the wreath turned out super cute.

We started the project by tracing our petal templates. We used a combo of colored construction paper and printed scrapbook paper.



I taught the boys how to glue their flowers together and they went to town. See my Easter garland post for directions and templates for these flowers.



I used a glue gun to affix the flowers to our paper plate base. See my nature wreath post on instructions for making your own wreath base.



I promptly hung up our masterpiece on my naked front door. Ezra was so proud when he showed his daddy our handiwork.

Hope you're inspired to get those kiddos to work with all of that vacation time on their hands. 😉

Easter Egg & Paper Flower Garland

I totally let myself hog this project. I needed some creative space and some mama time so I didn't invite the kids to help on this one. I warded them off by telling them I was making them an Easter surprise - which I kinda was. Kids can definitely help out with this project if you want. Little kids can stuff eggs and cut leaves. Bigger kids can make flowers and tie on the eggs.

This Easter garland boasts beautiful handmade paper flowers and plastic Easter eggs stuffed with treats. The eggs are tied onto the garland with pretty ribbons in coordinating colors.



You can hang it up or use it as a centerpiece along the center of your Easter table.



Kiddos can untie ribbons and open eggs after Easter dinner.

My inspiration for this craft was a gorgeous floral garland from Oh Happy Day. It was wrapped around a giant paper maché egg. How fun is that? I love that site. I've since become obsessed with paper flowers. Stay tuned for a Mother's Day craft that's just as fun and pretty.

A dollar store is a great place to pick up supplies for this craft. Michael's will do too. For this project you'll need:
- construction paper in pastel colors
- a glue stick
- green twist ties (the kind you get at the grocery store produce section)
- large and small pastel plastic Easter eggs
- treats to fill your eggs
- ribbon in multi colors
- a cheap garland



I started the project by making paper flowers. They are the most time consuming aspect of this craft. I saw a Martha Stewart flower making kit online and just kind of copied it. I made my own templates and got to work. Go to the bottom of this post for templates.

I made 3 large flowers and about 6 small ones. I used templates P1, P2, P3, B1, and L1 to make big flowers. Templates P3, P4, B2, and L2 make small flowers. Cut out all of your petals and leaves. You'll need 1 leaf, 1 round base, and about 6 of each petal size per flower. You'll also need to cut 1 or 2 half inch strips the length of your construction paper to make the center.



You can see one here at the bottom of the picture. Cut little slits along the whole length of your strip(s) to make fringe. Also, prep your petals by cutting a slit in them about 1/3 of the way up from the bottom. Glue one piece over the other causing the petal to pucker as you see above.




Cut a small green twist tie in half and glue half of it to the base leaving half of it hanging out. That way you can use it to affix your flower to the garland. Next, glue your leaf down onto the base.




Now you can start gluing down your largest petals overlapping them a little as you go. Then glue down the next size. Big flowers have 3 layers, small flowers have 2. Once your petals are all glued fold your leaf up a bit so it isn't so flat looking. I even added a little glue to the big ones to attach them to the side of the big flowers.

Last, roll up your long fringed strip like a fruit roll up and glue it closed. Bend down some of the fringe starting at the outer edge leaving the fringe in the middle standing straight up or bending it in towards the center a little. Glue this to the center of your flower.




Once your flowers are ready to go stuff your eggs with treats. I used chocolate peanut butter eggs, chocolate bunnies and carrots, and cute little Easter erasers.




Cut lengths of ribbon for your eggs. I like the ribbons to dangle festively from the garland. To tie on large plastic eggs you'll need 16 to 18 inch pieces of ribbon. To tie on small or medium eggs cut 10 to 12 inch pieces. Tie an egg on to your garland to make sure you like the length of ribbon hanging.




Instead of starting my garland from scratch I used a dollar store garland leftover from Nora's birthday party. This cheap garland was simple and sparse - the perfect base for adding a whole bunch of cuteness. You can also use a long sturdy ribbon.




First affix your flowers to your garland interspersing them evenly along the length. Then you can start tying on eggs. The stuffed eggs will make your garland a little heavy so take that into account if you hang it.



Happy Easter crafting! Here are my templates.