Mom’s Day Gift

This is a really neat idea for a Mother’s day gift to make with the kids and give to Grandma. Everybody loves flowers and special gifts. These flowers are made of white coffee filters and aren’t they just lovely, like carnations. These beautiful flowers will look fresh for a long time and this mason jar vase will definitely be a keeper.

Would you like to make one? I’ll show you how I did it!

Here’s a list of supplies you need to make this sweet Mother’s day gift:

For the vase you need

• a well cleaned mason jar
• a glue gun and hot glue
• chalk paint  (any brand)
• a rather small paint brush in a suitable size considering the jar

For the flowers you need

• white coffee filters (three per flower)
• scissors to cut paper
• a regular office stapler
• wooden grill sticks to make the stems
• green paper tape (floral tape) to cover the wood sticks
• a pencil
• and a glass to draw circles with

Let’s start with the mason jar:

First you need to make sure the jar is perfectly clean. If you wish to have cute 3D decorations on the vase, now is the time to plan the details you’ll make. These 3D’s can be made with a hot glue gun, so keep this in mind and don’t plan shapes that are too detailed.

If you choose a simple pattern or shape you just can take out the glue gun and proceed freehand. I made a simple heart with hot glue on the both sides of the jar on this one. If you’re going for something more detailed you should draw the outline with a marker (that can write on glass) and then use the glue gun following the outline. Please, be extra careful with the hot glue. It is HOT!

Now we’ll let the jar cool and work on the flowers instead.

Here’s how to make the flowers

For this you need the coffee filters, a stapler and a glass to help you draw circles.

Take 3 coffee filter papers at the same time and have them piled up. Use a stapler and staple them in the middle. One staple is enough. Then draw a circle around with the staple in the middle of it and cut the circle.

Now start “crumpling” the paper slices one by one and lift them up around the staple. Even little toddlers can help with this part! You can vary the shape of the flower as you like by folding the layers different, for example narrow or wider fold will look different.

Grab your paint and paint brush
Let’s go ahead and start painting the jar. With a coat of chalk paint you’ll turn that plain jar into a one-of-a-kind vase. I used chalk paint and it worked well with glass. Another option would be to use spray paint but for that you should go paint outside in fresh air. With kids it’s more fun to do with brush on paint.
To paint the easiest way is to just stick your hand in the jar, if hand fits of course.

Flowers need to have stems

When you have enough flowers ready, you should make the stems for these beauties. Wooden grill sticks make great stems. You only need to cover them with green paper tape and attach it to the flower. Take the paper tape and just wrap the wooden sticks with green tape and that’s it! You could add some leaves, too using the same tape.

Attaching the stems

Push the sharp part of the rod to the bottom of the flower. You can use Fiskars Fingertip Detail Knife to make a little hole in the bottom. Add some hot glue, too to secure stems in place.

If you wish to have your flowers colorful there’s a neat way to add color.

Use watercolor: Dip the top of the flower quickly and carefully into colored water. To do this you only need a tiny bit of water on a plate or in a bowl and a few drops of watercolor. Filter paper will the absorb the colored water which will be very interesting to see for the kids.

Adding more details

I looked at the vase and thought that it definitely needed a little extra. So I added some pearls (from a broken necklace) to the center of the heart with hot glue and painted the outlines with white. Of course Mom’s gift needs a card and a very special note written on the back.

Happy Mother’s Day to all moms!