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  • Pages
01 Contents
02 50 years of regions
03 Words of wellbeing
04 Sending plastic packing
05 Building confidence
06 My biggest challenge
07 Activity for you: floral art
08 Summer shopping
09 Rainbows activity 1: Play it
10 : Feed into the fun
11 Guides activity Game plan
12 Rangers activity: Girls in charge

Unwind with our floral activity

With lockdown restrictions loosening and life slowly starting to resume, it’s still important to take time for ourselves.

According to research published by the BBC and University College London in 2019, engaging in visual arts, such as crafting, can help us avoid stress, clear our minds, and improve our self-development. All of which is beneficial to our mental health and can help us build self-esteem.

The study, which involved 50,000 people, showed engaging in new creative activities, regardless of how skillful you are, can have a positive effect on our emotions and wellbeing.

As spring settles and the days get brighter, many of us are looking forward to walks on sunnier and warmer days. And you could make the most of getting out by combining your walks with this floral activity.

You will need:

  • Flowers and/or foliage
  • Parchment paper or white paper (this can be recycled paper)
  • Heavy books or iron
  • White card (feel free to use any other colours you may prefer)
  • PVA glue
  • Small brush
  • Tweezers
  • Scissors
  • Photo frame (optional)

First step – Find your flowers

Although it’s not illegal in the UK to pick most wildflowers for personal, non-commercial use, or forage most leaves and berries for food in the countryside, we must be considerate of our amazing pollinators and other wildlife which feed on them.

For these activities and where possible, we recommend you make the most of fallen blooms and branches you may come across during your walks. Or if you are fortunate enough to have a garden, you can pick them from there.

If you must pick wildflowers or weeds from public spaces, please make sure you don’t uproot them. It’s also important not to pick any plant on a site designated for conservation, such as national nature reserves and sites of special scientific interest in England, Scotland and Wales and areas of special scientific interest in Northern Ireland.

Second step – pressing your flowers

Before you begin arranging your flowers you need to press them. There are many ways you can do this, but we’re going to focus on the two easiest.

Using a book

  1. Pick the heaviest book you can find, like a dictionary (or the phone book!)
  2. Place your flowers and foliage facing down in between two pieces of paper – this can be parchment or any white paper you may have – and then place them in the book. You can repeat this in the same book, but make sure to space them out so the weight and moisture is distributed evenly.
  3. Once you’ve placed the flowers in the book, you need to weigh them down for pressing. Put more books or a heavy object on top of the closed book.
  4. Leave the flowers or foliage to dry inside the book for two to three weeks.

Using an iron

If you’re short of time or don’t want to wait three weeks for your flowers to dry, this is a much faster way to press flowers.

  1. Place your flowers face down between two pieces of parchment paper and lightly flatten them with a heavy object, like a book, this will help create an easier surface to iron.
  2. Set the temperature of your iron to low and make sure to turn the steam and water off.
  3. Place the flattened flowers and parchment paper on your ironing board and press the iron down on the paper for 10 to 15 seconds, letting it cool each time – you don’t need to do a swiping motion like when ironing clothes.
  4. Continue to carefully lift the paper to check if the flowers are dry and stop once they are.

Third step – creating monograms and cards

Once your flowers are dry you can use them to create beautifully arranged cards and monograms which make great gifts – for friends, family or for yourself!

  1. Cut the card to the size you’re after – this will depend on whether you’re making a greeting card or framing a monogram. If you’re doing the latter, make sure it matches the size of the frame you’ll be using.
  2. Before gluing anything down, use tweezers to place your flowers on a separate piece of paper to practice the final arrangement of the flowers. You could also use a pencil to lightly trace your design. Be careful when handling the flowers or foliage as they will be very delicate.
  3. Once you’re happy with the look of your composition, lightly brush the back of your flowers (covering the stems, the petals, and the leaves) with the PVA glue and start arranging them on the card, making sure to place those with longer stems and leaves at the back, and single flowers on top.
  4. When you’ve finished placing the flowers, set the project aside and let it dry for at least an hour. Once dry, if you have decided to frame your creation, you can now do so.

This activity was designed to give you some space to yourself but, if you enjoy it, you can share it with your girls too.

If you have any activities for leaders to take on that you would like to see in guiding magazine, please send them to: yourvoice@girlguiding.org.uk

Share the creativity! Use these social media buttons to share this project with your friends

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