Recycled Coffee Cup Rose

Save your leftover cardboard coffee cups and create pretty paper flowers! A Recycled Coffee Cup Rose from Heidi Borchers is a pretty, eco-friendly alternative to the real thing. Make a bouquet and give it to someone you love.

Materials:

2 Cardboard coffee cups with corrugated cardboard sleeves
Aleene’s Super Thick Tacky Glue (Use for lasting hold )
Glue gun (Use together with the Aleene’s Super Thick Tacky Glue for a quick hold)
Acrylic paints
Brush
Wooden skewer stick
Toothpick
Cardboard tag

Instructions:

To begin to shape cup into a flower, press in at the sides.
Continue to press cup down by pushing the sides in and the bottom of the cup down.
When cup is completely squished down, it should look something like this.
To help hold, use a toothpick to apply small amounts of glue the folds of the cup.
To make the center of the rose, cut a 2″ x 3″ section of the rim of the cup.
Place Tacky Glue at the bottom edge and roll with rim at the top of the flower.
Add a small amount of the hot glue to the Aleene’s Super Thick Tacky Glue. Roll into tight bud for center of flower. The hot glue will hold it quickly, the Tacky Glue will hold it forever.
Using both glues, glue this bud into the center of the flower. Let glue dry.
For the stem, insert a wooden skewer to the back of the flower. Place a small amount of glue to hold skewer in place.
Using several different shades of pink and red acrylic paints, brush several layers of paint until cardboard cup is covered completely.
Paint the wooden skewer stem green. Cut the leaves as shown from the corrugated cardboard sleeve. Paint leaves green. Let paint dry.
Glue leaves to the stem. To give as a gift, make a gift tag, and tie into place on the stem. Make tag large enough that you could attach a gift card to the back of tag.