Creativity 521 #91 - Origami Tulips for Mother's Day

With Mother's Day coming up, as usual, I wanted to do something simple but handmade with the girls. Before you get it wrong, no, I don't just get them to do something for me, I take the chance to ask them to make something for their grandmothers and even great-grandmother too. Yes, it's the perfect occasion to show our appreciation for these people who brought us into the world, raised us, loved us and gave us so much to be thankful for.

I didn't want to spend too much money so I dug around our house in search of recycled and craft materials. Then, an inspiration hit me when I thought about our recent trip to Tulipmania at Gardens by the Bay. Why not make some origami tulips, put them in a vase and include a personalised card? Here's sharing how we did it in today's Creativity 521.

Materials:

1) Empty toilet rolls
2) Scrapbooking paper
3) Origami paper
4) Photo printout
5) Coloured pens
6) Ribbon
7) Gem stickers
8) Scissors
9) Glue
10) Pipe cleaners
11) Long ruler
12) Pencil
13) Sticky tape

Firstly, we measured the height and width of the toilet roll and cut out a rectangle from the scrapbooking paper which would wrap around it nicely. You can use glue or double sided tape to stick it onto the roll.

It was the perfect chance for the three year old to practise her cutting skills and I must say she is getting better every time! I simply love that focused look on her face.

Next, using the base of the roll, we traced a circle on the scrapbooking paper, cut it out and glued it on.

We left them to dry for a while while we started to work on the tulips!

I printed out a tulip origami instructions so that the kids can do it step by step. You can also watch the video tutorial first so that you can pretend to be an origami expert and be able to help the little ones.

Here's how the tulip should look roughly. I couldn't find our origami paper so I cut squares (about 15cm by 15cm) from construction paper instead.

To make the stem, insert the pipe cleaner all the way till it reaches the tip.

The big girl has been very fascinated with origami recently and so it was easy to see that she enjoyed making these tulips. Can't say the same for the little sister because it's still too complex for her age.

To personalise the flowers, Angel wrote the words "Happy Mother's Day XXX. Love from Angel and Ariel" below a photo of the two of them taken at Tulipmania.

I love how colourful the photo looked and that she wrote every word with a different colour (it was totally her own idea). Even though the hubby was home and wanted to bring them to the playground, she let the meimei go first and didn't stop till she finished all the cards. Kudos to you, dear Angel!

Stick a pipe cleaner to the back of the photo using sticky tape and you can also tape this, and the flower stems, to the inside of the roll so that they do not move about too much. Jazz up the vases by sticking on some 3-D stickers or tie a ribbon and you are all done!

Ta-dah! How do our origami tulips look?

Here's wishing all mums a Happy Mother's Day 2016 and may we treasure each day we get to spend with our beloved kids!

For more DIY ideas and craft tutorials, visit my gallery here.