Seasonal Crafts

Foam Flowers

Supplies: Foam sheets of assorted colors (similar to foam stickers but without the stick); pipe cleaners; scissors.

How-to: Cut flower shape in foam. For a layered look---like the blue, pink, purple daisy in image above---cut similar flower shape on two or three pieces of foam. Cut out a foam circle for center of flower. Gently poke pipe cleaner through center of flower and top with flower center. Curl the top of the pipe cleaner (with pointy scissors or pliers) so wire doesn't stick up. Cut green leaves. (I did double leaves, say like a straight mustache, cut with fancy-edged scissors.) Poke pipe cleaner through middle of leaves. Display!

Variations: Use buttons for center of flowers. Add a little sparkle by putting some glue on the petals and sprinkling them with glitter.

Foam Posy Bouquet

How-to: Follow directions above to make foam flowers. Hold your bunch of foam flowers into a bouquet shape. You may have to adjust the leaves or make longer, one-sided leaves for the best look. Gently twist the pipe cleaners together. If you need extra sturdiness, twist pipe cleaners around a small stick. Fold the bottoms of the pipe cleaners up so no sharp points show and the lengths are all the same. Tape up the pipe cleaners just below the bouquet all the way to the bottom. (If you don't have florist tape, a stretchy white medical tape should work because it's not as slick as Scotch tape.) Tape the stems several times, especially near the bottom and folded stems. You may want to wrap a ribbon around the stems as well, gluing the ribbon down. Finish with a ribbon bow and streamers.

Falling Leaves

Supplies: Tempera or finger paints, paper, leaves from different types of trees (not crispy ones!).

How-to: Gently hold a leaf on a piece of paper and paint around it. To get crisp outlines of the leaves, brush your fingers from the top of the leaf outwards, in a circular pattern around the leaf.

Variations: Instead of fingers, try a paintbrush. You can use many flat objects instead of leaves.