Celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month by making these colorful flowers!
To make a one flower you will need:
- 1 green chenille stem/pipe cleaner
- 3 sheets (12-by-6-inch sheets or larger) of colored tissue paper.
We used white, blue & pink. - Ruler & scissors
- Prepare the tissue paper. Take the tissue paper out of its package, stack three sheets on top of one another, line them up, and cut into 12-by-6-inch sheets. (For larger flowers, use bigger sheets and cut to your desired size). After you cut them, be sure your sheets of tissue paper are stacked and lined up once again before you begin folding your tissue paper.
- Start with the shorter side (in this case, the 6-inch side) and make a 1-inch fold to start off an accordion fold. Tip: If you are making several of these flowers, lay multiple tissue paper sheets on top of one another at the same time before cutting to size (at least six to 12 sheets is ideal.)
- Make accordion folds. Once you have made a 1-inch fold in your stacked tissue paper edge, turn your tissue paper stack over for the next fold, then turn it back for the fold after that. Keep folding and turning over the paper until you have an accordion-style narrow strip of tissue paper.
- Round the edges with scissors. Take your scissors and trim the ends of the stacked tissue paper strip so that you have a rounded edge. This will help your tissue paper petals have a rounded appearance, like the petals of a real flower, when you unfold the flower later. Be sure to trim both ends of your folded tissue paper stack.
- Add the stem. To make sure the stem is centered, fold the tissue strip in half and place the green pipe cleaner or chenille stem at the fold. Loop the “stem” around the middle of the folded tissue paper strip. Twist the pipe cleaner to hold the tissue paper strip in place.
- Gently peel open the layers. Starting on one side, begin opening up the tissue paper folds you made. Be sure to pull apart the folds evenly from both ends.
- Separate the tissue paper sheets. Gently separate the tissue paper sheets to unfold the petals of your flower. It will quickly begin to look like a beautiful blossom!