Saturday, March 26, 2011

Wedding Planning

I got engaged on Dec. 26th, 2010, and I've been planning for the set date of April 21st, 2012. The one problem is my mind is stuck on decorations more than anything else, just because it's the most inexpensive and FUN part of it all (minus the actual wedding itself).

Annnnyways. My name's Nikki and I really like crafty things. My problem though? I get distracted easily from the crafts I'm doing so when I finish something it's always really nice to show it off.

One of the first projects I found was off the Martha Stewart website, with paper roses. You use coffee filters, some floral tape, floral wire and water colors to create these amazing creations. They're a tad challenging to make but very rewarding. I made 3 or 4 so far, here are some that I made.



I pre-printed out the templates from the website and attached them to black poster board to make them stronger. I just hold them against the coffee filter and cut along it to get the petals. In total there are 6 different templates, and you will use 8 coffee filters per rose (template 5 & 6 are cut out twice).


Once the 8 coffee filters are cut you place them on the floral wire using the instructions (I watched the video, it was easier to understand what was needed) and use the floral tape to keep it there. The first 4 are the hardest part to do, after that it's just 3 petals at a time per level. It takes some practice to get the layering down so that there aren't a lot of blank gaps. The finished product looks like the rose to the right.


Once the rose is all put together you get all the watercolors. I use
Artist’s Loft™ 12 Pieced Watercolor Paint Set
that I got from Michael's for only $4.99. (This was a great buy since I wasn't sure what colors I was wanting to experimenting with. I picked purple as the main color for my wedding so I need to go back and buy just white and purple.) You have to put a base coat of a watered down white, then the watered down base color (the main color stands out more if you paint it white first), then you trace the non-watered down main color along the edges of the petals.

Once the painting is done it needs to dry for about 24 hours (I bend the wire and hang it up in the bathroom on the towel rack). Once it's dry the most important step to make it look real comes to play. Using a skewer (the ones for kabobs is what I used) and you curl the petals (at a diagonal from the point of each petal). When you curve all the petals you get the finished product.


I finished a few purple ones and one pink one, and I think they look gorgeous! Each one (not counting drying) takes about 40 - 60 minutes to do, so I can't do it that often between work and school...but they're very inexpensive, I believe I tallied it up to be approx .50 cents per flower? I plan on using these in my wedding centerpieces, which when I get closer I'll try to put up how I want that to be set up.

Hopefully this is a good first post, and I want to bring many many more to the board of discussion. <3

19 comments:

  1. It amazes me how real they look when you get done with one of your flowers. You put a lot of work into making them (I saw firsthand), and it shows, good job <3

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  2. Nikki,
    I've been trying to make these, and have watched the MS video several times, I don't understand the "sandwhiching" of first couple of petals, perhaps you can explain it better than the video?

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  3. Hey! I watched the video about 80 times.

    The first petal after sliding the wire inbetween the right side of the petals I just rolled the right set of petals inwards then took the other side in the same directions. The 1st & 2nd petal are the same concept, and the 3rd and 4th I rip the edge off and just wrap it around like one long sheet.

    Hope that helps!

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  4. I'm sure your wedding was amazing, considering how beautiful your roses turned out. God bless your marriage. Pam

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    1. It was great! We got married April 21st, 2012. We ended up not using these, but the wedding did turn out beautiful.

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  5. Hats-off to Niki,you have an amazing talent of making the paper flower and also given a nice different color to the flowers.Good Luck for Niki wedding ceremony.If anyone needs the information of planning a wedding,then you may use wedding app and get the information from it.

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  6. Im wondering how you are coming along in your wedding planning. I think I hopped over from you link on the MS flower tutorial. I just copied the pattern and will be using a cereal box as my template. I am going to use the other coffee filters as I dont have this cone style on hand at the moment. Ive made 50 +/- of a rolled type that I see you did with a magazine. I used the coffee filters and these came out like a sweetheart rose size. I am going to try the MS ones but not sure how long my creativity will hold out. They seem a little more time consuming- I made all the ones I have in about 3-4 hrs start to finish. You can take a peek at mine if youd like.

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    1. Sorry for the delay. They are very time consuming, that was the only thing I didn't like about them. I have one at my desk at work and get a lot of compliments on it, so it's worth it! I love the colors of your flowers, they are really nice! Those look like they would be a lot easier to do!

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  7. Great wedding planing! Really thank you!

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  8. Wow, I will not spend so much time on these. But I want to congratulations for you!

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    Replies
    1. Thank you for the congratulations! The wedding was amazing.

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  9. Hi!

    What brand of coffee filter did you use?

    Thanks :)!

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    Replies
    1. Any white flat cone shaped coffee filter would work.

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  10. I have also made a whole bunch of these roses, while on a holiday in Atlanta,GA Simply beautiful ans my son said I was obsessed with them!!thank you

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  11. nice job I love making these.

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