Celebrate Green Blog

by Lynn

Time to get crafting for Valentine’s Day!

Making beautiful papers is an art. But it can take a lot of time and equipment. Here’s a very simple way to make a valentine that a small child can do with heartfelt, if less than sophisticated, results.

Supplies

• A variety of thin papers. Newspaper can be used, if you’re willing to settle for a gray valentine (which can, incidentally, be painted). Otherwise use toilet paper, wrapping tissue and paper towels to avoid day long soaking.
• A sink or cake pan filled with water. Color the water with coffee, tea, grape or blueberry juice or any plant based color if you’d like.
• Piece of window screen a little larger than you want your finished valentine to be. If you have an empty picture frame, you can nail or staple the screen to it. This makes the screen easier to handle, but it’s not absolutely necessary.
• Seeds that germinate easily like zinnia and marigold.

How-to

• Tear paper into pieces no larger than ½” square.
• Soak the pieces in the sink or pan, with just enough water to cover, until the paper is mushy.
• Dip the window screen into the mush.
• Lift screen out. The mush should cover one side. If there are holes where there is not enough mush, pick a little up in your hand and gently fill in the holes or simply re-dip the screen
• Lay the screen on a flat surface and sprinkle seeds over the sludge. Press seeds into the sludge using your palm or the bottom of a pan. Press hard enough to flatten the mush and squeeze out some water. You can use a rolling pin too.
• If it’s a nice day, lay the screen with the mush on top, in the sun. Otherwise, find a warm spot inside (not directly over a heating vent or on a radiator) and allow to sit undisturbed until dry. How long? Depends on the thickness of the mush.
• That mush will be the paper. Peel carefully from the screen.
• Cut into shape of a heart.
• This paper will most likely be quite rough so you might want to write on another, smaller heart, then attach it to your handmade paper.
• Let the recipient know that the paper can be torn into smaller pieces and planted in the dirt or simply dipped in water, put in a plastic bag and allowed to sprout, then planted.

And if you’re looking for more creative Valentine’s check out this post about making them from everything from shoes to eyeglasses!

Have you made seeded paper before? Any additional hints?

Lynn Colwell and Corey Colwell-Lipson are mother and daughter and authors of Celebrate Green! Creating Eco-Savvy Holidays, Celebrations and Traditions for the Whole Family, and founders of Green Halloween®.