Incorporate nature into this Spring-y garland! Materials Letters Twigs Craft wire Scissors Embroidery floss Coffee Filter Flowers Coffee filters Water Food colouring Cooling racks Containers Scissors Craft tray Smock Putting it Together Beads (you could use un-finished, paint them or purchase pre-painted beads) Cord Scissors Chenille sticks Directions Go out into nature with an adult and collect twigs. Arrange your twigs into letters. You may need an adult to help you to break them into pieces. Overlap the parts where the segments of the letters of the letters join. Wrap them with craft wire. You may need an adult to help you cut it. Wrap over the craft wire with embroidery floss if you like for a finished look. (This is a great way to practise tying knots!) Coffee Filter Flowers For Easter we made a garland with dyed coffee filters (please see the process below) and we wanted to transform the extras into flowers to decorate this garland. First we created a dye bath with water and food colouring- the more colouring you add, the more vibrant your filters will be. Dip the edges of your filters and spread them out to dry on your cooling rack. If they are quite saturated, then place a plastic tray underneath to catch any potential drips. Allow to dry overnight. For this garland, we then folded our dried coffee filters in half. For the leaves we went with 2 layered on top of each other. We cut out leaf shapes on the edges. We did the same with the flowers but used 3-5 filters and cut the edges into a more petal shape. We then put the petals inside of the leaves and made a small snip on the opposite (flat) side for inserting the stem. Gently put the chenille stick through the green leaf filters, then the flower filters and added a bead at the end to make the flower centre, tying a knot at the end. Before we added the flowers to the garland we also found it helpful to put a small bead on the underside (where the flower meets the stem) to hold it all in place. Putting it all together: With your cord, knot your letters and flowers on, creating your garland. We also added a few wooden beads. A needle was helpful to this process. We curled the ends of our stems with a pencil so that they looked a bit “vine-ish”. Gently wrap up your garland and send it to a friend! Purpose Working with various materials (manipulating wire, tying knots, experimenting with dying techniques etc.) Getting out into nature Safety Notes Use scissors and wire with care & supervision. Cord, twine etc. can be a strangulation hazard therefore it should be used with adult supervision and for the intended purpose. Beads can be a choking hazard and should be kept out of reach from those ages 0-3 years or those that tend to put things into their mouths. We recommend that you use a craft tray and a smock to protect your clothing and surfaces from damage from the dye. Please like & share: Leave a Reply Cancel Reply Your email address will not be published. Name* Email* Website Comment Notify me of follow-up comments by email. Notify me of new posts by email.
