Today contributor Tracey Radford is sharing a sweet paper tube posy to brighten up your home. There’s not much you can’t make from a paper roll, is there?

The bright tissue paper flowers look so easy, making this a perfect Spring craft idea for kids. It’s also a great recycling craft!

Make a pretty paper roll posy! This is a sweet flower craft, kids craft and Spring craft #spring #kidscraft #springcraft #papertube #paperroll #recycledcraft #papercraft #kidscrafts

How to make a paper tube posy

A pretty posy of flowers that won’t fade! Just a cardboard tube and some coloured tissue paper and you’re on your way to a bright bouquet.

You will need:

Toilet paper tube (or part of a kitchen paper tube)
3 sheets coloured tissue paper (can be same or different colours)
Craft scissors
Glue stick
Green paint (or mix blue and yellow)

How To:

Paint the tube green and paint most of the inside too.
When the paint’s dry, squeeze the sides together at the top to make creases. Cut along the creases, to about halfway down the tube.
Make two more cuts, opposite each other, halfway between the ones you’ve just made. Try to make them all the same length. You should now have 4 evenly spaced cuts, but don’t worry if the spacing isn’t perfect, it will still look lovely!
To make the stems, cut down the tube just to the right of one of your original 4 cuts.
You don’t want the stems to be too thick (between 0.5 and 1cm/1/4in. to 1/2in.). Repeat, to the right of the next original cut. Try to make the stems roughly the same width. Do the same to the right of the 3rd and 4th cuts, so you end up with four thinner strips (stems) and 4 wider bits inbetween (these are going to be the leaves).
Bend these wider pieces out and cut them into long, leafy triangle shapes (cut down from the middle to the bottom corners).
For the flowers, place the 3 coloured tissue paper sheets on top of each other and cut a strip (make it about 4cm (11/2in.) wide) You could fold the sheets a few times to make the cutting easier. Hold onto your strip to keep the pieces together.
Cut the strip into square shapes, or squarish squares…that’s fine!
Rub some glue stick at the top of a stem and stick the middle of a tissue paper square to it. We wanted to use yellow in the centre, so started with a darker colour, but choose any order you like. We used two squares of each colour per flower, so 6 squares for each one.
Rub more glue in the middle of the first piece of tissue paper and stick the second one on top, but turn it so the angle is different from the one below.
Keep adding the squares, turning every time and pressing firmly in the middle to make sure they stick. Do the same for the other three flowers.
Once the glue has dried, get hold of the middle two pieces with your fingertips and give them a gentle squeeze (for a nice tight centre), and then give the whole flower a squeeze, all the way around, to shape it. Do the same with the others.
Bend the leaves into place, bending the tips down.

You could tie a bow around the bottom, to finish off your posy – or, pop into a yogurt pot ‘pot’. Stick pieces of wrapping paper around the pot to cover up any writing.

About Tracey

Tracey Radford is a former BBC journalist turned children’s craft book author, who loves making things out of ordinary, everyday stuff that usually gets recycled or thrown away. This simple approach to encouraging creativity is at the heart of her two kids’ craft books, ‘Make Your Own Zoo’ and ‘Make Your Own Farm Animals’. Tracey has also written a series of board books for little ones called ‘Animal Fun!’ and a picture book about Brian the Lion. She lives in Herefordshire in the UK.

Tracey blogs at Jumble Tree and can also be found on Instagram and Facebook