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Dried Pressed Flowers: Pressed flower greeting cards…wow!!

Before you can start pressing some blooms there are a host of things you require having at hand. Here’s a list of all those necessities,

•    A bunch of fresh delicate flowers
•    A sheet of good quality paper for making cards (I personally prefer hand-made paper)
•    Coffee filters
•    The phone book
•    Tweezers
•    Glue
•    Scissors
•    A firm brush

Now the process begins.

• First, take your bunch of fresh flowers, sturdy with nice open blooms and leaves. Don’t go for too thick ones, applicable both for flowers and leaves as they take a lot of time to dry well. A few good examples of plants that dry very well and comparatively faster are, Buttercups, tiny daisies, California poppies, ferns, pansies and clovers.
• Next, press the flowers and the leaves carefully into a thick telephone directory. Be careful, see that none of the petals get destroyed or overturned. Some of the blooms may leave a slight yellowish tint on the pages amidst which they are pressed, so better use a book that is not that important. In case you want to protect the pages from discoloration, you can press them between flattened coffee filters which absorb the moisture in the bloom while they get pressed.  It will take around two weeks for a nice pressing.
• Once the flowers and the foliage have dried remove them gently form the book with a lot of care. Now arrange them artistically on the sheet of paper. If you find some stems have gone array then you may trim a few with the scissors.Now remove the foliage and the flowers from the sheet of paper but remember exactly how you had placed them. Now brush a nice thin layer of glue onto the paper just in the places where you had placed the pressed flowers and foliage.
• Now with a very soft hand places the blooms back onto the places where they were placed previously. This may be a little messy. A tweezer may prove real handy.
• Now place all the blossoms and the foliage nicely stuck to the paper, see that each one lies flat on the surface of the paper touching the glue firmly. Now leave them entire array to dry.

So, the basic is ready for you. You can cut the paper into deemed shapes or fold into cards making nice accessories all together.