Today, I thought I’d create a DIY flower confetti tutorial that’s fun and easy to make. You can create these flowers with just about any watercolors, but they’ll look more vibrant with professional-grade paints. You can start with any paper you know will respond well to watercolors: I chose to use 140 lb. cold-pressed watercolor paper. Begin by painting a blob of any color you like.
Follow up that blob with other floral-ish blobs like the ones below.
Add a couple of perky leaves to some of your blobs. {To make a leaf, you’ll paint a simple, somewhat rounded triangle.}
{At this point, you can add brown or green to the centers of a couple of your flowers, if you wish.}
Once your paint dries {it doesn’t take long}, use a simple gel pen to draw a circle over one of your blobs.
Then, draw a series of crescent shapes along the inside of the circle.
Draw some crescent shapes within the crescent shapes:
And continue to draw increasingly small crescents until you have something that resembles a rosebud.
Once you finish your first flower, it’s time to move on to another blob. Starting in the center of the flower/blob, use your pen to draw a few squiggly amorphous shapes like these:
Continue to draw those amorphous shapes in a pattern like the one shown below. You’ll end up with a pretty, geranium-like flower!
I’m moving on to a sunflower-type shape now. My goal isn’t realistic flowers here, so I used a sketching technique to outline the center brown circle a couple of times, as well as each of the petals. {By “sketching technique”, I don’t mean anything fancy — really I’m just saying I drew quickly!}
Once I finished my sunflower, I moved on to another … well, brown and yellow blob, for lack of a more eloquent way to say it. I just did a bunch of dots in a circle pattern, then drew a few lines with circles floating above their tops. {You’re really just going to have to look at the picture below to understand what I’m saying.}
The next flower I did was really simple: I just drew over the pink part with a spiral, then I outlined the leaves.
Taa-daa! These are ready to be cut into flower confetti.
I used regular, run-of-the-mill scissors to cut these flowers out. I like the look of a little bit of white around the outline, so I didn’t take any pains to ensure I was cutting exactly around the flower.
See what I mean? All of these have a little bit of white around them, and I think it adds to the whimsy/handmade effect.
At this point, I know you’re thinking, “Okay, Lindsey, this is all well and good, but what on earth am I going to use ‘flower confetti’ for?” I am sure you can find many uses for them, but here’s what comes to my mind:
Envelope Confetti
Slip these in the folds of a letter or in a card. When your recipient opens the card or letter, the floral confetti will tumble out. {As a bonus, these flowers are a lot easier to pick up than traditional confetti, or, goodness forbid, glitter, which stays around forever!}
Floral Bookmark
Glue these on a hardy strip of paper such as card stock or watercolor paper. Boom: instant, beautiful bookmark.
Pretty Envelope
Glue your DIY flower confetti on an envelope of a contrasting color. I love kraft paper because it’s earthy, which goes with the overall whimsical nature theme of the flowers.
Other Ideas
- If you’re hosting a meal {hello, holiday season!}, these are great to sprinkle around the table to add a festive feel. For winter flowers, I’d stick to whites, dark greens, grays, and deep reds.
- This DIY flower confetti is precious to have a flower girl throw at a wedding.
- Use big flower confetti for gift tags!
- I use these as whimsical product photo props from time to time.
If you have any other ideas, please let me know in the comments — I know that you’re creative and probably have something in mind that I didn’t think of!
Warmly,