Pressed Flowers

Hi Folks,

My flowers have now been pressing for a month and I thought I would write a few lines to let you know how they are doing.

I'm really surprised that they have all maintained their colour and look as vibrant as they did when alive.  I have broken one or two as they are very delicate and great care is required when removing them from inside the book.

I will have to do some more research but next time I think I will try placing a couple of pieces of baking paper under and over them in the book to help with the sticking or perhaps some blotting paper would do the trick and help with the moisture at the same time.

This was just an experiment so I am super happy with the result that I have achieved.  I will be rushing out to my garden in Spring to get the first blooms and next time a bigger book to press them in.  An old phone book perhaps.

The only thing left to do is seal them to preserve the colour and protect them.  I believe hairspray does the trick but I reckon some PVA glue applied with a soft brush would do the job just as well, maybe even better.  Another experiment...

Pressed Flowers

Hello everyone,

Today I'm super excited to show you my new love..........pressed flowers.  I have only recently discovered that when you press fresh flowers, they keep their colour!  This was totally news to me as I always thought that once pressed, they changed to a browny colour.  This was from a memory I had from childhood of when I used to press the leaves of roses in between book pages - they always turned a brown colour so I assumed it was the same for all flowers - not so!!

Two weeks ago I picked some flowers from my garden and decided to give it a go.  I placed them into a book separating them between pages and then carefully closed the book.  At this point you need to add weight so I piled all of my heavy books on top and then just left them to do their thing.

This process takes a few weeks and mine are not ready yet as they have not fully dried out.  However, they are keeping their colour except for one which has browned slightly but I can live with that and it may suit me to have a few brown ones for some of my projects.

I plan on using these flowers on my greeting cards and in my handmade journals and I foresee endless possibilities for their use.  I believe they need to be sealed once dry though and I have read that hairspray is one of the options for this but I need to research this some more and I will post here again once my flowers are fully dried and I have removed them from the book.