Flowers

I have always admired people who make miniature flowers. For my very first dollhouse, I made some generic flowers (possibly lilacs) that I still have, but that clearly need improvement. I made roses for my market stall and some more for the Playmobil house, but that's it. I never got round to making anything more elaborate.

The other day I was browsing Pinterest looking for something different to make. I was down and restless for a good reason and needed a challenge. I found this page and felt it was just what I wanted, although it felt totally intimidating. However, I had all the time in the world and no risks. After trials and errors, here is the result.

 

It wasn't as difficult as it looked. It was just a lot of precision work and patience and swearing. But it was fun and very good for my self-esteem. I didn't take any step-by-step pictures because the tutorial is there for everyone, but I will tell you what I did differently, for various reasons. For instance, I don't have a punch (and won't consider getting one in the near future) so I simply cut the petals from paper. The first set was far too large, and the flower didn't look natural so I had to discard it. Luckily, I only made one, to test. I am a profoundly decimal person, so 3/16" really makes no sense to me, even though I have a converter. I used intuition.

I don't think I had ever before worked on such small objects. Fringing these tiny pieces of paper felt almost weird, and I kept asking myself: Why the h-ll are you doing this? Answer: because it's fun. In which case, just go on.

I used the paper I had, plain coloured printer paper. I happened to have two shades of yellow. The green paper I had didn't look natural so I painted the leaves afterwards. I didn't have a "small round stylus" (not even sure what it is), but the advice to use a nail file was very helpful. All in all, for the very first attempt, I was pleased.

Next day, inspired by approval from my miniature groups, I started on irises, from the same site. When I shared the result, one comment was that they preferred more conventional colours, and so do I (blue are my favourite), but again, this was the paper I had at home at the moment. I may make some blue ones later. While I was at it, I improved the daffodils, adding more leaves, and I planted both in terracotta pots the origin of which I don't remember. I used coffee grinds for dirt. 

 

From the instructions, I don't know what Fun-Foam is (remember, friends, when you post tutorials, that your readers may be from other parts of the world; do not use brand names for any materials, glues, paints or stains. It's not helpful and can be frustrating if it's impossible to figure out what you mean). I didn't have green floral tape, but I had white surgical tape that I painted green.

This gave me a boost of confidence and a desire to make more, and one of my long-time dreams had been to make orchids. I didn't find a good tutorial for mini-orchids, but now that I understood the technology, and looking carefully at my 1:1 orchids, I thought I might be able to make it. I found good templates for paper orchids on wedding sites!

Since this is indeed my own project, I will describe it in more detail. Orchid stems are different from daffodils and irises, and I needed to make branches for individual flowers so it had to be several wires put together.

I realise I am doing what I have just told you not to do - showing a brand product, but it really doesn't matter, any floral wire will do, or actually any suitable wire since you will anyway need to cover it with tape, whether floral or surgical. The picture below shows what it looks like. Of course you will then paint it green.

Orchid flowers are complex, which I could state by looking at my real ones. After daffodils and irises, I was prepared to cut each petal separately, but then I found these templates for wedding decorations (who and why makes paper orchids as wedding decorations??), and cut three sets. Again, the first one I did was too large. These petals are really, really tiny.

For the large petals, I used plain white paper. The coloured paper I had wasn't suitable for an orchid, and I tried to paint the petals, and they looked awful. So there is some practice to be done. The beard I painted with nail polish. Then I made a hole in the middle of the flower and glued them on stems.  Then I bent and curled them to add form and volume.

The leaves were easy to cut and crease, and again I had to paint them to look more natural. And I had to check real orchids to confirm that leaves do not grow around the main stem, but on a separate stem. Orchid roots are bizarre. I made them from wire that was already bent (from old binders), and I covered them with surgical tape and painted light green. Again, I used coffee grinds for dirt - luckily, we drink a lot of coffee so there is no lack of this useful material.

There is a lot to be improved, and of course I will want to use other colours, but as a first attempt, and without instructions, I am pleased. Now that I have all these flowers I should probably make a flower shop.