For a fun bouquet or just something to add a little pizazz to gift wrapping, these tissue paper carnations are a unique way to give flowers.

The project is incredibly easy and inexpensive. My 12-year-old made these in under half an hour.

The materials are simply:

Colored tissue paper

Decorative pencils

Pencil Eraser Caps

Small elastics

You can use any color of tissue paper, even white – or layer different colors for a rainbow effect. Lay out your tissue paper in layers of 4 – 6 sheets. 4 makes a loosely petaled flower, 6 is a bit tight and harder to work. We found 5 sheets were about right. Then measure a rectangle of about 5 – 6 inches wide and about 10 – 12 inches long. This will determine the size of your flower but the great thing is that it doesn’t really matter if you are exact or if you eyeball it. The edges don’t even have to be particularly straight as when you fan out the paper, these inconsistencies will only make it look more real. This makes it a great project for kids who may not be as meticulous about measurements and straight edges.

Once you have your rectangle, start an accordion fold at one of the ends. Fold on the short side, not the long. Fold over and over as if you were making a fan. Each fold should be about 1 inch width. When you are done, fold it over to find the middle, then unfold and place an elastic around the middle of your now 1 inch wide folded fan.

Take a pencil and wind the elastic on the pencil end, just under the metal band that holds the eraser on. Placing it here keeps it from slipping off easily. To ensure it doesn’t slip off, place a colored eraser cap over the eraser. This also makes the pencil more useful as the owner will be able to erase with it without removing the flower.

Now fan out both sides and grasping the edge of the innermost tissue paper layer, start pulling it up towards the middle. Once you have done that, do the next layer and the next and so forth. Pull each layer on both sides towards the middle until your carnation is formed.

You can make several of these and give them like a bouquet of flowers. Alone, these tissue paper carnations can be attached to gifts instead of bows for a unique decoration.

An easy craft for kids and one that uses lots of creativity. A little folding, some glue and a few sparkles will render some unique, handmade ornaments that your kids will love and you will too.

You will need:

*Sturdy paper – construction paper or thicker, white or colored

*Scissors

*School glue

*Sequins, sparkles, glitter, beads, gold or silver spray paint.

*Something round to trace the circles onto the paper. An overturned glass will do.

Trace circles onto the paper and cut them out. You will need 8 circles for every ball ornament. Fold the circles according to the diagram and when you are done folding, open it up and cut on one fold to the middle (the dotted line in figure 4).

Now, pull 1/4 over the adjacent 1/4 and glue together so that you have a little cup of only three sides. Do this for all the circles. When you have them all done assenble you ball by gluing them together to form a ball. You can either spray paint them gold or silver once assembled or have the kids individually decorate each piece before assembly using glitter, beads, sequins, anything they can imagine. It’s fun to assemble differently decorated cubes togather for interesting and unique ornaments.

When the ornaments are assembled you can punch a small hole at the top to attach a string or glue one to the middle of the cubes as you assemble them.

For an individualized and complementary Thanksgiving centerpiece, make your own cornucopia. The materials and construction are simple.

You will need:

One cornucopia. Get the size that best fits your table.

Styrofoam block or ball in a size that will fit about halfway into the horn.

Silk flowers or ornamental plants. You can get these in traditional autumn colors or make them fit your dining room decorating scheme.

Place the styrofoam ball or block in the horn and push it down so that it fits snugly about halfway. Next just stick the stems of the flowers into the styrofoam and arrange to your taste. The only requirement is that you use enough flowers to hide the sytrofoam and make sure they are of varying lengths, but that some are long enough to drape elegantly beyond the rim of the horn and onto the table.

When I was very young, someone (I don’t remember who) taught me how to make a paper dart. It was only much later that I realized that the design I’d been taught was different from everyone else’s paper darts. Instead of being the usual trangular shape, mine was a complex thing of triangles and rectangles. And, in my entire lifetime, I have never met anyone who makes darts the way I do. But it is such a good flyer that I have stayed with it and never learned how to make those triangular things.

And now I have decided to share my secret knowledge with the world (oh, you lucky people!). Here is how to make a completely different paper dart.

Fold a reasonably clean and flat piece of paper (any size, as long as it’s not square) so that a top corner meets the opposite edge, as in Step 1. Then fold it out again and do the same with the other top corner. Then unfold it and you should have something that looks like step 2, with creases where the lines are drawn.

Take the top corners of the paper, one in each hand, and pull it towards you, at the same time pressing in on the sides with your free fingers. You might have to encourage the very tip of the paper to fold correctly but it should look like Step 3 as you’re doing it. Then press it down flat so that the new folds become permanent.

At the base of the triangle you have created, grab an outer corner and bend it towards the centerline of the paper, again folding it flat when the edges line up, as in Step 4. The drawing shows the left side treated in this way while the right remains to be done.

When you have completed both sides, grab an outer of corner of one of the two triangles just created and fold it in to the center line again, as shown in Step 5. Repeat on the other side. Then fold the tip of the triangle towards you and down so that it covers the top of the triangles – as in Step 6.

Now fold the paper inwards along its center line, shown by the dotted line in the drawing. If you have been reasonably accurate with your folding, all the edges should meet and the sides be equal. All that remains is to fold out the wings along the line shown in Step 8, squash the folds flat so that they retain their shape, and you have a unique paper dart. It should look like this:

The great thing about this design is that you can alter its flying characteristics by forcing the wings into better profiles and perhaps even making small cuts to create ailerons and a tail. Have fun!