Poinsettia Tutorial

Hi all!!! So sorry for that long hiatus. I have had so much going on. I am back and raring to go though and I thought I would kick this week off with a tutorial on how to make paper Poinsettia's. I love Poinsettia's and this year when I pulled my velvet ones out of the ornament box I thought I could recreate them in fun patterns and textures with paper. So I set off to play and this is what I came up with.

I have made them in many different textures with many different techniques this week. I will give step-by-step for one technique and the others are pretty easy to do once you have the basic steps down.

**an apology in advance for my very messy fingers and some blurred photos. Hoping Santa brings me a new camera! :)
Supplies Needed:


Score board & Score tool (mine is by Martha) any will do
Paper trimmer
Cardstock
Scissors
Glossy Accents
Pearls or bling
Copics (optional)
Crackle paint--Rock Candy (by Tim Holtz/Ranger)
6" piece of string or twine
Craft mat or glass mat

(Step #1) Cut cardstock to 3.75 (h) x 4.0 (w)


(Step 2)Score at 1", 2" and 3"


(Step 3) paper should have 4 sections



(Step 4) fold on folds until you have a 1 inch x 3.75 inch stack in your hand



(Step 5) snip off ends to make points. You can measure your cuts. I eyeball it. I put my scissors in the middle and then turn them 45 degrees and snip. Then repeat on other 3 sides.

This is what you should have when all sides have been snipped and you open it up.

(Step 6) Add score lines. You should have a score line every 1/4 in. again. I eyeball it. I don't use measurements but rather the lines on my score board. I score every TWO lines.

***NOTE--the middle score lines do not go to the edges of the paper. I score about a 2 inch line.

***NOTE--Don't worry if they are not even. These are to help bend the paper in the next step. The fold won't really show in the middle when we are done.

This is what your finished score lines should look like.

(Step 7) Now we need to do an accordion fold. Lay paper down and make your first fold a PEAK fold (next a valley, then a peak etc.). Your finished product should look like this.

(Step 8) Take your bakers twine and tie it in a firm knot around the middle. Getting as close to the middle as possible is important so that your petals are the same length.

(Step 9) Separate folds. Don't pull too hard.

(Step 10) Do the same to the other end :)

(Step 11) Make sure 2 peaks and one valley are facing UP. This is the FRONT of your Poinsettia petals. Take your scissors and carefully cut the FOLDS BETWEEN the petals. Not the petals. It's not pretty when you cut the petals...don't ask me how I know ;). Snip until your scissors tips are right next to the twine. Repeat for all of the folds.

(Step 12) Manipulate petals to bridge gaps. Don't worry about perfection here. It will come I promise! :)

(Step 13) Pick up flower and use fingers to pop the tip of the flower back & the wings out. Press on peak fold in back and on top.

Manipulate until a Poinsettia appears.


(Step 14) Take Copics and color in streaks. I used R24 Prawn, R29 Lipstick Red & R46 Strong Red. There is no right or wrong way to do this. I scribble like a 2 yr old. I wait until this step because it's easier to see where shadows fall. You are just trying to add some dimension and depth here.

(Step 15) Add some Distress Crackle Rock Candy to your craft mat (I have a glass mat on my workspace that is 16x24)

(Step 16) Paint the crackle on with a paint brush. The reason I put it on the mat is so that if any Copic color comes off it won't contaminate my jar. Paint this stuff on THICK! Set aside to dry. You can also sprinkle on some glitter at this point if you want too.

This is what it will look like when dry! :)

(Step 17) add your pearls

Make some leaves out of paper and paint with crackle too or cover with Distress Stickles in Rock Candy! I forgot to add mine to the card above before I took pictures.

There are so many options when it comes to these. I stamped the one on the card above with a Hero Arts Cling stamp before I scored it and cut it. You can make them out of patterned paper, you can emboss them you can crinkle them. The possibilites are endless. you can add brads or buttons to the center or bling instead of pearls. Really you can do so much. You can even make the poinsettia's smaller (but be warned they are tough to accordion fold and score)

Here are a few examples of some others that I made. I have been making these for 3 days. Can you guess what's going on my Christmas cards this year?



This one is the actual one I used in the tutorial but I sprinkled some Doodlebug glitter on it while it was still wet with the Crackle Rock Candy. I used a brad in the center of this one too. I just snipped the ends of the baker's twine off. You can also use longer twine and tie a knot in the top of it to use them as ornaments.

A closer look @ the card above.


I totally goofed on this...but it worked. I stamped the word JOY in a dark. red. I put white embossing powder on it by accident instead of clear. I just kept heating it until the red poked through and it turned my powder pink! I can't tell you how thrilled I was with this mistake. It went beautifully.

And finally--(Whew)a card I made with a smaller sized Poinsettia. It's crooked and off but it works. This one is sprayed with Perfect pearls.


Note: All stamped flowers use the Music Note Cling Stamp by Hero Arts (CG222). It's so versatile! :)
Well that's it. If you have any questions just let me know by leaving a comment and I will gladly answer them.

Thanks for stopping by and making all the way to the end!

Happy Holidays! :)