Monday December 22, 2008

Festive flowers

You Can Do It
By TERESA WONG

Poinsettias evoke a timely look for Christmas.

POINSETTIAS are such sought-after potted plants during the Christmas season. The blood-red upper leaves impart a christmassy look and add to the festive mood. I remember once, after Christmas Day, feeling dead tired from trekking for days from village to village in North Thailand, and how I cheered up instantly at the marvellous sight of a poinsettia bush.

How about a kiss under the poinsettia?: A poinsettia wall hanging to spread that Christmassy, loving feeling.

The three bright poinsettias embellish this wall hanging to wish your loved ones and friends much love, joy and peace this Christmas. Merry Christmas, folks!

Christmas Wall hanging

From toilet rolls, kitchen towel rolls and foam food tray

You need:

11 toilet rolls

2 kitchen towel rolls

Gold handicraft foil

Foam food tray

Twine or cord – 150cm

Cellophane tape

Acrylic paints – red and green

Gold glitter glue or gold glitter dust

PVA and UHU glue

Scissors and cutter

Making the poinsettias

Enhancing the yuletide spirit: Make a poinsettia to decorate your gifts.

1. Lightly flatten the toilet roll and cut it into half along the length. Cut each half into a leaf shape, with the leaf-stalk about 1.5cm to 2cm long. You’ll see that the leaf is curved down naturally on the sides. Make leaves from two more toilet rolls.

2. Use UHU glue to stick the leaves into a circle, overlapping them at the leaf-stalks. Press to adhere firmly. This is a poinsettia. Make two more poinsettias from six toilet rolls.

3. Paint the poinsettia with two coats of red acrylic paint, allowing each coat to dry in between.

4. Draw veins onto the leaves of the poinsettia with the glitter glue and let dry completely. Or you can squeeze glue in the shape of the veins and sprinkle gold glitter dust over them. Allow the glue to dry before shaking off the excess glitter dust.

5. Cut 2.5cm squares from the gold handicraft foil. Crumple them into tiny balls by rolling them between your thumb and fingers. Glue them in the middle of the poinsettia.

6. Cut the remaining two toilet rolls into leaves, but trim them slightly smaller. Paint them green before adding in veins with gold glitter glue. Attach a pair of green leaves with glue to the underside of two poinsettias.

Making the Christmas wall hanging

1. Cut a piece of gold handicraft foil, big enough to wrap up the kitchen towel roll. Give an allowance of 2cm on both ends. Add PVA glue along one edge of the foil, place the towel roll on it and begin to roll it up until the other end. Glue the foil firmly to the roll. Wrap up the other towel roll similarly.

2. Push the twine through one roll and pull to adjust it so that the lengths are equal on both ends. Thread the ends into the second roll and pull them out of the openings on the other side, crossing them inside.

3. Adjust the twine to space out the rolls 5cm apart. Add cellophane tape to fix the twine in position on the inside of the rolls.

4. Position and glue two pieces of poinsettias with green leaves onto the top roll.

5. Poke two holes near the middle of the remaining poinsettia. Thread the ends of the twine into the holes and adjust the poinsettia to lie just above the pair glued onto the roll below. Tie them into a knot at the back. Bring the twine over to the back of the poinsettia.

6. Trim away the curved sides of the foam tray with a cutter. Turn the tray over, smooth side up. Cut strips 3cm wide and then cut them into rectangles of 2.5cm by 3cm. Cut letters out to spell PEACE.

7. Stick the PEACE word onto the lower roll. If you are up to it, cut out small letters to form the words LOVE and JOY and stick these on either side of PEACE.