Like It Love It Gotta Have It Project for March - Rosettes

I've seen a lot of rosettes lately on projects, but I had never tried making one myself until last month. I thought it would be a good project to share with you for our challenge this month. You can experiment with different sizes of rosettes, and different papers, border punches, and you can even weave ribbon into the edge! Here's how you do it:


Start by cutting a strip of paper - I used strips 1 1/2 inches wide by 12 inches long, but you can experiment with different sizes. Notice on one of the strips I tried using a border punch....
































Next, make accordion folds the entire length of the strip - I folded at about every 1/4 inch. Now for those folks who really feel the need to be precise, you can mark your strip every 1/4 inch, but I just estimated. You know who you are! :)

















Put a piece of STRONG tape on one end.



















Then join the two ends.





















It's going to stick up - not to worry! We'll make it flat in a minute! To do this we need to make a base - I just punched out a circle from a punch I had handy. You can cut a random little piece of paper -it doesn't matter what kind or color, because we're going to cover it up. Put glue on the base - I used a wet glue. A tacky glue would probably work fine too.


















Then press the rosette onto the base and hold it until the glue is set. I found I needed to put something on top of it - it can take a while. Actually, one of my punches worked good to put on top - the accordion pleats make it strong enough tht the punch doesn't smoosh it.
















There you have it! Now for the fun - finding something to put in the center and making variations of the basic rosette! Try different kinds of paper - don't be afraid to try stipes! Look below - I tried stripes in both directions:















And then I tried lacing ribbon through the edges of one (do the lacing before you put the strip into a circle):


















Here is the one done with a border punch:



















And finally, pick a topper for your rosette. You can use all kinds of things - small flowers, brads, buttons, and small die-cuts!













Let's see what you can come up with:

Like it: Just try making a rosette - any paper, any topper
Love it: Try a punched border
Gotta have it: try lacing the ribbon through the edge!