Tuitorial for Dying Flowers & ribbons

Normally when we think of dyes around Easter we think of dying Easter Eggs, but what about dying flowers too?? Believe me, they can be just as much fun! Follow this step by step tutorial and I am sure you will love the results!

Supplies needed: Paper towels, Wax Paper, shallow containers, water, re-inkers, paper flowers, neutral colored ribbon (White Daisy or Colonial White) and heat gun.

Begin by adding just a little bit of water into a shallow container: approx. 1/2" deep.
Add desired amount of re-inker to the water.

Stir the re-inker until the color is mixed up.
Gently place ribbon into the dye-water mix.
For darker colors, allow the ribbon to stay in the mixture longer.

Pull the ribbon out of the ink mixture and lie flat on a piece of wax paper.

Using a paper towel, gently blot the ribbon on the front side.
Flip the ribbon to the backside and repeat the blotting.

Allow ribbon to dry.
If time needs to be expedited, use a heat gun to dry the ribbon faster.

Dying Paper Flowers.
Begin with assorted flowers (paper or crocheted).

Dip the flower into the ink mixture so that it is completely saturated.
Note: be careful as the flower will then become very fragile.

Place the flower on a piece of wax paper.
Blot with a paper towel.

For lighter colors, let the flower dry on a paper towel.
This will pull more of the color from the flower out:
giving a pastel look.

The upper flowers have dried on paper towels.
The lower flowers were dried on wax paper.
The difference can really be seen in the two Crystal Blue flowers below.

Once the flowers have dried, use them in your projects!
Below are cards that use both the dyed ribbon and flowers!

If you live local to the Harrisonburg area, we will be playing with this technique tomorrow (Monday) at the Shocker's crop! We will be making the above cards, but if you aren't a card maker, you can still come and play: just use your flowers and ribbon on your scrapbooking layouts! For more details, click here.