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Silky Recycler Valentine

© Traute Klein, biogardener

You can make the most beautiful greeting cards with old tired silk flowers. How about some Valentine cards?

Those Dusty Old Silk Flowers

You can make beautiful and quite original Valentine cards which will stun the people who receive them, because no one will ever have seen any cards like it. Do you have old silk flowers or silk flower arrangements around the house gathering dust? If you don't, I bet some of your friends do, and they would probably be happy to donate them to a useful purpose. If you cannot find any, have a look in secondhand stores where you will should not have to pay more than pennies for them. I got mine for nothing in our church rummage sale where no one wanted to buy them, so I asked the ladies in charge of the rummage sale to donate them to my Sunday school class, and they were happy to oblige.

Getting the Flowers Ready

Actually, those flowers are not made of silk any more but of nylon, a material much more sturdy than silk. Silk deteriotes after some years. Nylon lasts forever.

Pluck the socalled "silk" parts off the plastic stems and leaves.

Discard the plastic, i.e. throw it in the garbage.

Sort the silk petals into colors. Decide which colors will be suitable for Valentine cards, mostly pinks and reds with maybe a bit of other colors for accents. Save the rest for Mother's Day or birthday cards.

Getting the Cards Ready

Valentine cards are traditionally handed to people personally without envelopes, so you need not worry about matching the cards to envelopes. They do not even need to be folded over. It depends on how much you have to say to the person for whom you are making it. If you have some idea of how you want to arrange the silk flowers on the card, you might want to draw some background for them with permanent felt pens. You will also want to write some text on the backside of unfolded and on the inside of folded cards. Be sure that you only use permanent pens, because the washable ones will smudge and get the flowers dirty.

Applying the Flowers

To attach the flowers or petals, you need some Tacky Glue or Super Tacky Glue. That is the only glue which keeps them looking new and feeling flexible. Any other glue will turn the nylon stiff and ugly. Arrange the flowers on the front side of the card in some pleasing design. The flowers don't have to remind you of real ones. Fantasy flowers are great fun.

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