Ribbon Flowers

I recently learned this new technique to make my own flowers from my ribbon stash and thought I would share it with you. I used my flower on a card but they would be great for layouts, mini books or projects of all kinds. You can make them as big or small as you like and with as many petals as you wish.

The first step is to gather your supplies. I used a card a made from Bazzill cardstock and some of the new stickers and ribbon from the Cosmo Cricket Girl Friday line.

Next cut your ribbon into strips. The size of the strips depends on how big you want your petals to be. Then you are going to fold the ribbon in half and glue the 2 ends together. (I just used my tape runner to stick them together for now.) You will want to glue the same side of the two ends to each other so it gives it that great loopy look. Cut another strip for your stem. You can even make leaves for your stem in the same way as the petals. See example:

The next step is to attach your stem to your project. You can do this in many ways; sewing, tape runner, tacky tape, glue dots, brads, staples....whatever look you are going for. For mine I lightly tacked it down with my tape runner then zig zag stitched over it. Make sure you tuck your leaves under the stem before sewing to make sure the cut ends don't show.

After that the next step is to tack down your petals. Once again this can be done in a variety of ways. You can lightly tack them down then sew over them when you attach your center or tack them down well and glue dot your center down later. I choose to lightly tack them down with my taper runner then use my sewing machine to stitch over them in a few spots to be sure they wouldn't move.

Now it's time for your finishing touches. I added a button with a glue dot for a center, a best friends sticker, and doodled around the edges a little.
I hope you will try this technique at home. There are all sorts of flowers out there that you could make!