Painted Tissue Flowers + Printable Template

Forget about mice. The Mrs. gets to play while the Mr.'s away.

It's a well known fact that wifey get more fun projects done when hubby's out of the house.

Nothing against hubby.

Jason's work takes him out of town a lot. We both get bummed when we have to spend a week apart. So to make the time go faster for me, it's become tradition to tackle a DIY project to surprise Jason with when he gets home!

<--- one of the backwoods places his company sends him.

 Gah, jealous.





What did I chose? Where do these pretty tissue paper flowers call home? This project is just the beginning of a mini bedroom makeover!

 Keep reading, and get the downloadable template! (if you just can't wait, see "step 1")

Our bedroom has been begging for my attention for some time. This is how it looked in the "progress" pics I took last summer.

I wanted to totally switch gears and go in a completely different direction, like this-

Thibaut Wallpaper & Fabric

and this-

Coastal Living Magazine

and this.

House & Home Magazine 

Cool, light, and vibrant! :) I love the energy that's just bursting from these pics! And I'm digging the gray, white, marigold, and aqua pallette. I want to bring some zing to the space we spend so much time in.

I call my inspirational style Sophisticated Eclectic. Sophisticlectic... eclecticated!! The kind of bedroom Emily Henderson would design.

To make a color transformation in any room, one easy fix is changing up the accessories, like my flower arrangement on top of the armoire.

Time for a change! I still liked the idea of flowers, but I was not prepared to spend $7.99  a piece(!) on nice faux flowers at craft stores. Doin' the math, that's about $70 for an arrangement the size of mine. heck. Break out the tissue folks.

I'd never tried making flowers out of tissue paper before, but got to say I love this craft! It's easy, fast, and tough to mess up. A few investigations on Pinterest and I was ready to go.

Tissue Paper Flower Supplies:

• 9 sheet of Tissue Paper
• 7 ft. of wire 
• Scissors
• Paint and Paint Brush

**DOWNLOAD 

TISSUE PAPER FLOWER TEMPLATE 

HERE**


I uploaded the PDF on Scribd. If you don't already have a Scribd account, it will ask you to create a username and password to download or print the image.

Step 1. Square Up. Using template "A", or by eyeballing it, cut out 16 squares about 6" wide. Each of the flowers I made were a different size, ranging from 6" to 8" diameter. I think it adds a more organic feel and they look a bit more custom that way.

You can also vary how many layers you use. Less layers will make for a loser flower, and more layers a more compact one.

Step 2. Fold 'Er Up. Just like those paper fans we used to make in grade school, stack all the tissue squares together and fold into 1" creases (along the dotted lines if you're using the template).  

Step 3. Get Wired. Cut a 12" length of wire (or however long you want your stems to be) and tie the tissue fan around the middle. I used 26 gauge floral wire because that's what I had. It was way too flimsy to support the flower. I'd recommend using a thicker gauge wire for a low height arrangement like mine, or use  floral wire wrapped around a wooden skewer for a taller arrangement. 

Step 4. Petal your Papers. Cut rounded edges by freehand or using the second template ("B"). This makes the shape of each petal. This is very forgiving too, you can go more pointy or rounded, depending on your taste and what kind of flower you're going for.

Step 5. I'm not fat, I'm fluffy. Open up the tissue folds to resemble a bow tie. Take the top most layer of each side and gently pull it forward, separating it from the rest. I got a little carried away with how easy it was going and ripped a few : / so be gentle. Do this to every layer.

(don't worry about how the flower may look during this step, once the whole thing is fluffed, most imperfections disappear.)

Step 6. Painted {Flower} Faces. Brush a small amount of paint in the center of the flower. I used a bit too much on the first try and  got the tissue soggy. Use just enough paint to lightly dab on some color. I used Craft Smart in Bright Yellow for my sunny centers.

Congrats, we just saved ourselves $70! **applause

What's the end of the story? How did Jason react when he saw what I'd done?

I hadn't mentioned anything about my sneaky project while he was away. When he got home, I let him wander into the bedroom in his own time and "discover" my changes.

I heard a, "dude! this is awesome" from upstairs. 

My work here is complete.

Click to:

Pin with me on Pinterest

"Like" Clever Nest on Face Book

Tweet with me on Twitter

:)

UPDATE: Thank you Katie at Creatively Living for featuring my tissue flower project!