Bubble wrap flower printing for kids

It's fun finding things at home to print with, and bubble wrap has to be one of our favourites. We've used it before, to print cow parsley and wisteria - this time it's forget-me-nots (though it really could be any purply-blue wildflower).

I wanted to do forget-me-nots because they remind me of home. They appear all over our garden, in unexpected places, and always brighten things up.

Forget-me-not, forget-me-not
I'd say that's quite unlikely
since you spread your seeds like common weeds,
at least you're not unsightly..

In fact you bring a zing of spring to any garden nook
which is good news as clouds of blues are everywhere I look!

To make the stamps, cut out a circle of dots (7 dots altogether) and make sure you don't snip or puncture any of them, and glue to the bottom of a cork, or on top of a bottle lid would work too. Use strong glue like UHU or a glue gun if you've got one.

We also made a stamp with four bubble wrap dots, for a bit of variety.

You can of course print on plain paper, but we thought we'd brush on a green wash (using watered down green poster paint and a big brush)

For the flowers we put a good squirt of blue, white and purple paint on a plate.

Mix some of the colours together, but leave some unmixed too. Encourage kids to experiment with all the different colours and shades - dipping into the mixed colour and then dunking into some white or blue. This has a lovely effect, giving the flowers much more life and depth.

Try not to overload the stamps with paint or you'll end up with lots of blobs with no definition at all. To help avoid over-enthusiastic splodges, get kids to try their flower stamp on some newspaper first, which acts like a kind of blotter, before printing on the paper.

You could brush paint on the stamps instead too, but that's not going to be as much fun!

For the stalks, use the side of a coffee stirrer or popsicle stick. We mixed some blue into the green to make it darker, and as before, dipped the side of the stick into the mixed colour, as well as the plain colours, plus a little white too, which helps give the stalks more definition, as if they're catching the light. Get some white on the stick and press it along the side of a printed green line.

This is a simple way of achieving a more advanced effect, and it looks great.

For the leaves, we used half a potato and drew and cut out a simple small leaf shape.

If you want to add yellow centres, dot on some yellow paint using the end of your coffee stirrer, or popsicle stick.

Flower Power! Collection of flower crafts for kids

Making flowers out of ordinary stuff you can find at home is one of the most satisfying and joyful crafts to do with kids. And the added bonus is they make great Mother's Day or Valentines gifts!

I've gathered a few of my favourite flower crafts here. I hope you enjoy them as much as we did.

Click on the links for the full tutorials.

Easy Paper Flowers

We got so carried away with these! Very addictive. The house was covered in colourful paper flowers.  Very handy for collages and making cards.

Toilet paper roll posy

Just one toilet paper roll needed. We made the flowers with tissue paper... sticking pieces on the stems and then scrunching them up so they looked more flower like.

Then we tried paper hearts, which look like tulips!

This meadow scene is simple too - just some zigzag cuts in a toilet paper roll to make the grass, then add any flowers or wildlife you like. You could add things you spotted on a walk, so your little scene tells a story.

Then there's the classic egg carton flowers. You can't go wrong with them. The cups and the cones from an egg carton are perfect for flower shapes.

Here's our Spring Flower Posy

And a sweet bouquet of roses

Egg carton cups are also great for making poppies.

This little bouquet of roses made from cereal box card, paper and an egg carton cone makes a sweet little fridge magnet.

These Tissue Paper Peonies are fun to do and look so pretty.

Printing flowers with stuff you already have at home is a great activity, and perfect for making cards for Mums or loved ones. You can do potato printing, use a toilet paper roll pressed flat to make a petal shape, or you could try some bubble-wrap flowers.

We used bubble wrap to print wisteria

and Cow Parsley

and last but not least, a tiny bouquet of flowers made from an egg carton cone, just the thing for a doll's house!