How to make your own corsage with faux flowers

DIY YOUR OWN CORSAGE WITH FAKE FLOWERS

Real corsages are gorgeous! But they can be a little pricey, especially for being a small part of the fancy attire. Our small town held a father daughter dance and I really wanted my girls to feel extra special and wear a corsage. Since my husband was taking three of our four daughters I figured it would be more cost effective if I ordered them from a big chain grocery florist. I looked online and they were $20+ per corsage plus $20 for my husbands boutonniere. A total of $80 for accent flowers…that was not in the budget. What I did instead was take a trip to our local Walmart and picked out some inexpensive flowers, hair ties, and floral tape. I spent a total of $13 and everyone got a beautiful corsage/boutonniere to wear to the fancy daddy daughter dance.

Affiliate Disclosure. Some of the links on this website are affiliate links, which means that I may earn a small commission if you click on the link or make a purchase using the link. If you make a purchase you will not be charged anything additional. This is just a way I can help add to our family finances to raise our four daughters. Please know I would never recommend a product or service I do not totally stand behind.

I’ll be honest, I tried to make one for the oldest of the four daughters when she was in the first grade and it turned out awful! I used a real flower that was WAY too big and it seriously looked like a Pinterest fail! This time around I extra crossed my fingers they would turn out as a win and thank goodness they did! The girls got SO MANY C0MPLIMENTS on them at the dance.

DIY FLOWER CORSAGE

Here’s what I used

• faux round roses

• faux babies breath

• faux spring flower bunch

• green floral tape

• felt

• scissors

• wire cutters

• black hair tie (pony tail holder)

• hot glue gun

• gorilla glue hot glue sticks

Make this DIY even more inexpensive by visiting your local DOLLAR TREE. They have a great floral selection depending on the season.

I found everything I needed at Walmart. I already had the glue, glue gun, and felt on hand so I didn’t need to pick those up. I also had a ton of supplies left over. I used some in their hair for little accents and then still had some left over. I couldn’t believe it cost around $3 per corsage to make. That beats $20/ wrist corsage any day!

1. I cut a rectangle that was smaller than the width of one of my daughter’s wrist. This is what I glued my flowers to. Then, I cut a second rectangle that was a little smaller than the first rectangle.

2. I picked out 2 main flowers for the corsages. I used these gorgeous round roses I found at my local Walmart that were about $3 per stem. I used 2 per corsage and 1 for my husband’s boutonniere. I made these round roses the focal point and added the other flowers as accents. I pulled the round rose flower heads off of their stems then I cut them flush at the bottom of the flower so that the bottom side of the flower was flat.

3. I started layering the flowers that surrounded the main flowers. This took me a little while to get the flowers where I wanted them to go. I used a combination of baby’s breath, lavender, and a spring flower bunch. I had to trim them up here and there, so don’t be afraid to do that too. This will keep your corsage from being gigantic. See the picture below, I had to trim down the lavender stems so that they wouldn’t be so long. I did this carefully making sure I wasn’t removing too much.

4. I attached the accent flower stems together. Basically I made double ended floral stems. I tried to make them somewhat similar in size in both length and width so that the corsage wasn’t lopsided. I didn’t make them identical, I used different accent flowers on each end but was sure to incorporate baby’s breath on each end. Then I wrapped the middle of the double ended floral stem in green floral tape to keep them together.

5. I placed them on the bigger rectangle to see where exactly I wanted to place them before I started gluing anything down. This is the time to trim your felt down if you need to.

6. Then I used my glue gun to glue everything down to the felt. I first glued down the double ended floral stem I made. Let that dry so that it gets secure. Then I glued down the main focal point flowers, the round roses.

7. Fill in the gaps. After I got the roses glued down and the glue dried I added in more accent flowers where I thought the corsage was bare. I even cut off single leaves, this spring bunch I picked up had the most beautiful soft lambs ear like leaves. I added in several of those leaves where I thought they would look good. I attached some to the sides of the roses. I also did this with the baby’s breath. Before I glued them down I was sure to double check I liked that placement. A tiny dab of glue is all you need for these little pieces.

8. Once I was happy with how it look and the glue was dry I flipped it over and added a thick hair tie. While recording this tutorial I actually attached my hair tie the wrong way. For the most comfort I suggest gluing on the hair tie so that the corsage lays vertically against the wrist. So you would want to attach your hair tie so that it would sit on the rectangle horizontally. Once that glue dries glue the second rectangle on top of the hair tie so that the hair tie is sandwiched in-between the two pieces of felt. This will make it really secure and will be difficult for the elastic to come off.

I hope you enjoyed this inexpensive tutorial. Like with all of my posts, if you have any questions at all please don’t hesitate to ask.

Happy crafting!

How to paint plastic flower containers for fall

One thing I really wanted for my fall porch decor were fresh mums. They are just so gorgeous and scream HELLO FALL! But the only problem was that I only had $20 to spend on things fall for our home. You can read all about how I made that happen in my budget friendly fall porch decorations.

Affiliate Disclosure. Some of the links on this website are affiliate links, which means that I may earn a small commission if you click on the link or make a purchase using the link. If you make a purchase you will not be charged anything additional. This is just a way I can help add to our family finances to raise our four daughters. Please know I would never recommend a product or service I do not totally stand behind.

I headed to Walmart, because I knew I could make the most of my budget there, and found some super gorgeous deep red mums for under $5 each! The only problem was that their bases were HIDEOUS. That super undesirable dark green/brown color, yeah you know that standard plastic flower base color that all the cheap plants come in 😆!

So I thought, hey just grab a can of spray paint and paint those suckers up! And I did!

I didn’t just grab any spray paint thought. I’ve had my fair share of run ins with bad spray paint so instead of grabbing a cheap $.97 can I splurged and picked up a can of Rustoleum. Since I didn’t want the bases to be shiny, I really wanted them to be dull to tie in with the rest of the fall porch decorations I opted for the orange MATTE finish and it turned out so pretty!

Here’s what I used RUSTOLEUM ORANGE MATTE FINISH SPARY PAINT

First you need to take your plants out of the ugly containers. You’ll want to set the plants somewhere that they won’t get sprayed with the spray paint.

Then take a wet wipe or damp cloth and wipe down just the outside of the container. You won’t be painting the inside so it’s not necessary to clean the inside of it.

Next shake your paint can really really well. This is pretty important because you want the paint to get all mixed together before spraying onto the container. If not you will have streaks of off color. Trust me this has happened to me before with CLEAR satin finish spray paint. I didn’t shake it enough and I got a streak of white across my project. So shake, shake, shake!

Then in short strokes spray the containers. If you spray too long in in one spot you’ll get a runny mess. I only sprayed my bases with one coat. This spray paint is AMAZING and literally covers like heaven so one coat is all you need.

Let it dry. Ideally you want it to dry for several hours before you plant back inside. I didn’t wait that long because I was pressed for time, I was filming this tutorial for my YouTube channel. If you can wait a few hours then place your plants back inside their painted containers.

That’s it! You now have gorgeous plant containers and they didn’t cost you hardly anything to makeover! Bonus if you already have the paint on hand!

I hope this helps if you are like me and on a tight budget for the non necessities. We can stay on budget and have cute things ;)!

Happy crafting!

How to make paper flowers without a cutting machine

I absolutely LOVE my Cricut cutting machine and use it almost daily but there are certain projects when it’s much easier to hand cut things myself. Being a buys momma of 4 I don’t always have time to wait on technology lol. Because we all know when we are rushed for getting a project done something is going to go wrong, like the app needing updated or the computer taking forever to start…that kind of stuff always happens, never fails.

I appreciate the simplicity of making hand cut flowers. There’s no need for technology. Each flower turns out totally and 100% unique. And it’s just plain fun! These small flowers are super simple and make a great starting point of learning how to make flowers by hand. If you can cut a circle and hold a paint brush then you don’t have any worries!

Affiliate Disclosure. Some of the links on this website are affiliate links, which means that I may earn a small commission if you click on the link or make a purchase using the link. If you make a purchase you will not be charged anything additional.

I had everything I needed on hand to make this but I’ve included the links where you can get some of these supplies. Yes, those are affiliate links but not to worry, you will not be charged anything extra if you make a purchase through them. They are just a way for this stay at home momma to help with the daily bills of raising our four little girls :)!

How to make hand cut paper flowers, no cutting machine required

Here’s what you’ll need

• scissors

• cardstock

• a small paint brush, pencil, or pen {you won’t be painting or writing with this}

• small beads

• LOW TEMP GLUE GUN
  

Start by cutting out three circles that are just a tiny bit smaller as the last one. I always cut the biggest one first then work my way to the smallest. I eyeball how big of a diameter I need for the space I’m filling. They will almost look like you are cutting out circles to build a paper snowman.

I chose cardstock to make my flowers out of but you can truly use any kind of paper you’d like. If you choose cardstock there are a few things you should know. One, it’s fancy a fancy name for thick paper {or at least that’s what I think of it}. Two, it comes in a wide variety of colors, thickness, prints, and textures. Three, it can be a little pricey but if you catch it on sale at Michael’s or any other craft store you can stock up at a really low price. This is what I do. Anytime I find cardstock on sale I grab what I can afford because I make so many different projects using cardstock. Like this DIY LIGHT UP FAIRY JAR , or this DIY VALENTINE’S DAY PALLET SIGN, or this adorable KIDS CATERPILLAR CRAFT. I used cardstock I had on hand to create all of those fun projects. And since I’m an impulse maker lol, I hardly ever plan my projects out ahead of time so having things on hand is just apart of my create process;)!

Taking your paintbrush, pen, or pencil and roll just the edges of each circle. I used a paint brush but a pen or pencil will work just fine too. don’t roll them too much as they’ll end up too curled under. If you don’t have any of these on hand you can always just use your finger to curl up the edges of your paper pedals.

This is what your circles should look like once you’ve rolled the edges. You can see they are starting to look like paper flowers already! I love you uneven the circles are, it makes them so unique!

Then glue the circles on top of one another, starting with the biggest circle as the base, the medium circle in the middle and the smallest circle on top. Just a small dab of hot glue from a low temp glue gun will work great. Add another dab of glue to top of the smallest circle and add some beads.

And your hand cut paper flowers are done. So cute right?!!! I added a few green leaves that I had already cut form a prior project using my Cricut cutting machine.

You can add these hand cut flowers to almost anything. I used them for this beYOUtiful sign that you can purchase in my Etsy shop.

Be sure to leave your pictures below of the gorgeous hand cut paper flowers you make using this tutorial.