Adding Poppies...Coffee Filters Turned Floral

When I look into the face of a flower,

it almost takes my breath away.

The vibrance of color packed into such a delicate form,

petals as soft as velvet delicately balanced on the top of a long green stem.

Incredible!

These are tulips that look very much like peonies.

I also love poppies.

I wanted to try to create some flowers to add to a sign I made for our basement door.

For each flower, I used three and a half color-stained coffee filters, a button, hot glue gun, and green tape.

To color-stain the coffee filters, I drizzled some paint into about 1/4 inch of water in my bowl.

(The more paint you use, the darker your flowers will be; or if you want your flowers a darker red, after they have dried from the first dip, you can dip them again .)

 Count out how many you will need, and dip them all at once,

or half at a time, depending on how many you are doing and what is easier for you.

Push them down until they are all covered in paint.

Pull them out and wring them out together gently 

(you may want to wear gloves for this).

After the red coffee filters are done, repeat this process to make the brown coffee filters.

 Once the brown filters are set aside to dry,

paint a patch of brown in the center of the red circles.

Lay them out to dry.

 In a day or so when the coffee filters are dry,

count out the circles that will be slightly smaller (two for each flower).

Gather them together and cut a few at a time.  It is not necessary to have these perfect.  Imperfection makes them look more like real petals.

Next cut the brown filters in half.  Crumple a half loosely

and glue the button to the middle of it.

(You can paint this button if you'd like.  I painted mine with a reddish brown glass paint, but as these buttons will not be handled, any paint should suffice).

To make the flowers, take the largest pink circle, gathering it at the middle.

Take a piece of tape to wrap around the gathering.

(I used frog tape since I had it on hand; florist tape is a good choice, too).

 I  had wrapped a wire with the frog tape as well,

so I wrapped the piece of tape around this "stem" and then around the flower base.

 Taking one of the smaller red-dyed coffee filters,

drip a bit of hot glue in the center and glue the brown-papered button center on.

Then take the other small red-dyed circle and put a drip of glue in the center of that one as well.

Place the layers together.

You can carefully crunch these up together to help give your petals a more realistic look.

 Then put the whole flower together by gluing the inside flower to the larger piece fitted with the green tape.

If you have any extra red coffee filters, you can glue some without the center pieces,

 

This makes a bloom that is almost ready to open.

To create a bud,

take the pieces left-over from the circles you cut to be smaller and roll them up.

Add some tape.

 I used the wrapped wire with flowers to drape around my door sign.

 

 The left-overs were added to some floral wire and put in a vase,

because I can never get enough poppies and the real ones just don't last long enough.

(The vintage image glued to the bucket vase is from the Graphics Fairy).

 These are simple and fun to make for oneself or even to use for decorating for a shower or party when flowers are not in season or easy to obtain.

Of course, the real ones are still best.

Happy crafting!

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