Folded Ribbon Roses

I cannot just have flowers in my girls' hair.  So I also make many hair pieces out of ribbon.  One that I remember making years ago, but had a very hard time finding a tutorial for was the folded ribbon rose.  I searched for a tutorial, but just did not find one I thought was clear or was really what I remembered.  So I knew I needed to put one together.  This has lots of pictures because I think its easiest to understand with the pictures.

What you need is ribbon. I 'm using a wide ribbon here, which is easiest, but you can use any size.  I'd just try your first one with a wide.  A glue gun, an alligator clip (or whatever you want for the back) and a lighter or something to seal the ends of your ribbon.

Take the flame of your lighter across the ends of your ribbon to seal them.  These turned out a bit ugly, for this project it wont matter.  It is important to seal them though b/c you dont want your ribbon to fray.

Now lets start folding.  with your ribbon laying wrong side up, fold the left end of your ribbon down.  You cannot see it very clear, but I have about two inces on the left side.  You dont want to have too much, but need enough to make it stable.

Now make another fold so your have a point like this. (Ignore the aligator clip in this picture.  Alison was trying to help out, you do not need it now.)

Using the right side of the ribbon fold the wrong side up, pulling the ribbon to the left. 

Make another fold pulling the ribbon up. Notice I rotated the ribbon counter clockwise in this picture.

Make another fold.  I think your starting to see a trend here.

Continue folding, you should have a square forming here.

Keep going until you get your desired thickness of your future rose.

Try to keep your square together so you have a hole down the center.

Now you will have some excess ribbon.  This is the ribbon that is on top of your square, not the bottom.  This is very important to use the top ribbon.  Twist the ribbon into a little point so you can shove it down through the hole in the center.

Push the excess ribbon through until It is tight on top like this.

Your underside will look like this.  You want to grap this piece that is sticking straight up with your thumb and pointer finger.

With your flower right side up begin twisting the piece between your fingers clockwise.  Be sure to hold all of your ribbon tightly together.  This takes a bit of coordination.

Keep twisting and you will see  your flower begin to emerge.

Looks like a flower to me!

Here is what your underside will look like.  Time to get our your glue gun and begin securing all of your ribbon so it does not unravel.  I cannot really tell you exactly where to glue, Just be generous and glue everything that looks lose.

Trim off all of the extra ribbon.  I put a dab of glue over the twisted ribbon to keep it in place.

Glue on your alligator clip.

This is what your finished bottom looks like.

Embellesh the top as you see fit.

I thought this one looked great without anything in the middle.  I usually just decide after its done whether to add something or not.  Again, be creative.  These can be attached directly to headbands, or even put a pin on the back and make it a broach.  Make a small one and use it as a center of a bow.  The possibilities are endless!  Happy Crafting!

Flower Hair Clips

So with two young girls I've been finding myself trying to find ways to make them look as cute as possible while they let me.  Alexis (5 months) really has no say in anything, so I keep her looking cute whenever she leaves the house.  Alison (4) is a little trickier at getting her to wear cute things, but I am determined to keep trying.  Anyways, these are something anyone can make.  So they are so cheap and ADORABLE!

For this project you will need a hot glue gun, an aligator clip, a flower and a gem or something to replace the center of the flower.  I left out the circle of felt.  Imagine a purple circle of felt laying there.  Be creative with your flowers, and you do not have to spend tons.  But a bouquet of discount flowers, remove the stem and just get started. 

 

The back of the flower just pops off..  Use the back to cut a circle of felt for the back of your flower.  I cut it out the diameter of the backing.  It makes it easier to make sure it wont show.  Sometimes if they are too small you mightneed to make it bigger.  Just make sure its big enough for your alligator clip.

With the back off you can pull the top off.  You are ready to disect and put your flower back together.

Start with the very bottom layer of the flower.  Put a dab of hot glue on it. 

Start layering your flower, putting it back together one at a time.

Continue to do the same.  Adding one little bit of glue each layer.  Try not to get them too thick, but also make sure its secure.

Once your flower is put back together, put a bit of glue in the center.

Add your gem!  Your flower is looking pretty good isn't it?!  You can be creative with this too.  I like the gems b/c I like some bling, but you can use the original center, or a bottle cap, or anything else you find that you like.

Your almost done, its time to finish off your flower. 

I cut a small slit in the felt and slip the top of the alligator clip through it.  I glue it to the felt.  Then put plenty glue on the felt and stick it to the back of the flower.  It keeps the entire flower secure and makes it soft against the hair.

Be Creative!

Use different kinds of flowers and make each an individual!  Have fun and happy crafting!

Tulle Wreath

It has been far too long since I have blogged!  I have missed posting, but unfortunately with a new baby extra time is something that I do not find often.  Hopefully I will be able to get on here and catch up on the posts I have been meaning to get on here fora couple months now.

BUT today I'm going to share a Tulle Wreath that I made.  I've been seeing these all over pinterest and just happened to have some extra white and red tulle.  With Valentines day right around the corner it seemed meant to be!  So I figured I'd just jump in and see how it went :)

To get started take your tulle and cut it into strips.  I did not measure, But mine are roughtly 3"x8"  I just cut them long enough to go around the wreath and tie and have excess sticking out... I did 3" but you could do wider or even less wide.. just cut a few sizes and see which works best for the look you are going for...  If you have different colors separate them, b/c these crazy things will end up all over if you dont have them group together somehow.

Gather the tulle and wrap around the wreath. 

Tie in a secure knot.  This is nothing special, just a knot.

Repeat this process OVER AND OVER AND OVER.  Make sure you get them as close to each other as possible.  For demonstration I tied this one further apart and pushed it close.  You can do that, but I have found it is easier and looks better if you just try to tie them close in the first place.

I added a ribbon to hang it with.  To do this I laid the ribbon on the wreath and tied the tulle over the top of it.  You could try to slide it under if you forgot, but putting it down first is much easier.  Push it up close to your excess tulle so it blends in a bit.

Go around the excess with your finger and press to get them as in line as you can.  They dont have to be perfect, but you do want them to line up some so it looks nice.
After you do this you can trim it all to be the same length.  I sort of like the different length look, but I had differences up to an inch (Probably an argument for why you should measure your strips instead of just cutting). So I cut them to make them look close to the same length.

Hang and Enjoy.  As I said earlier this one was for Valentines day so I thought Red and white would look good.  As I was making this I was thinking that I should have used blue tulle for the upper left area and make it look like a flag for the fourth of July.  The possibilities are really endless, christmas colors, halloween, etc etc.  Be creative and have fun.  This literally took me an hour or so to make from start to finish.  Definitely one you can do while sitting in front of the TV.

This is what it looks like with the ribbon hanging it.  You could shorten the ribbon to so it was not as obvious.  Be creative and make it your own :)  Happy Crafting!

Photo Card

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Frame Hanging Tip

I found this on another blog and had to share.  Please click here to find out how to hang a frame with much less hassle!!

Bottle Vase

I've been loving that it is fall and decorating for it.  Once I got all of my fall decorations out I realized that I had room for some more.  I hate spending tons of money on decorations that are only out for a couple of months, so I figured I would just ignore my need for them.  Then when I was looking online I saw wine bottles wrapped in yarn.  They were very pretty, and the wheels started turning.  I dont have yarn, but I have twine.  So I started playing with the bottle.  I didnt have enough twine on hand to cover the entire bottle, so I thought some more.  I had left over burlap from my banners.  YAY!

So this is what I used:

  An empty cooking wine bottle.
A piece of burlap that was as tall as the flat part of the bottle, and could wrap around it twice. 

Twine or yarn

Hot Glue Gun and Scissors

Make a verticle line with your hot glue on your bottle and start wrapping the burlap around it.  When finished add more hot glue to secure the burlap.

This is what your bottle will look like. 

Now put some glue around the top of the bottle and start wrapping the twine around it.  You either need to put very little glue or wrap fast b/c the glue dries fast.

Wrap the twine around until it meets the burlap.  I wrapped it around about four more times after it met with the burlap.  It will look like the above picture.  Now you could be done here if you wanted, but I thought it looked off balance, so I wanted to add more twine.

Glue and wrap around the bottom of the bottle again.  Go up as high as you think looks good.  I just eye balled it and glue it all in place.  This is your finished piece!

You can use different bottles of sizes and different materials.  I thing it looks really nice and I would probably pay money for it in a store, but what I love best is that I used things that I had laying around, so there was no shopping or buying.  Here is another style I did:



Halloween Decorations

Its that time of year again and I couldnt be more excited!  Since Alison has been born we just have not  had the opportunity to decorate for Halloween.  We lived in an apartment for the first two years, and then last year we had just moved here.  So this year I decided it was time to decorate.  Now I tried to do decorations that she and I could do together.  Her and I both had fun with decorating.  We still need to carve pumpkins, but that will not happen for another week or two.  I'll update pictures if I change anything.  But I am pretty happy with these for now.  Its not over the top but its fun :)

I created spiderwebs at our enterance with white yarn.  It went together really easily and was fun to be creative on how to make.

This is a wreath that Alison and I both made.  There is no tutorial needed, we simply used a wreath form (made one from plumbling insulation from lowes) and then shiney halloween garland we bought at the dollar store.  The sign was also from the dollar store, so we just wrapped the garland around and attached the sign.  It was a great craft that Alison could help with a lot. 

I made another spider web around our front windows to add a bit to the Ghosts that we had already made.  I added some bones and pumpkins too.  I am thinking maybe if we get a chance we'll make some tombstones, or that could be a project for next year.

We had to make sure some ghosts were in our tree :)

The Burlap Banner was the only decoration I did myself. 

Halloween is a fun holiday for me, I think its definitely one that is most fun when the decorating is done with the kids, they are the ones that enjoy it the most too.  It will be interesting to see how our decorations change as the kids get older and are able to do more difficult crafts :)