CHAPTER LXI

PATTERNS FOR PAPER FLOWERS

DEAR GIRLS AND BOYS:

Don’t you want to make a flower, now that you begin to know how wonderful they are?

TO MAKE A WILD ROSE

Materials required:

Pink, green, yellow tissue paper; white tracing paper; very _fine_ wire; heavy wire for stem; yellow beads; small piece beeswax; pair small pincers; scissors; glue.

1. To make the _corolla_,—

(_a_) Lay a piece of pink tissue paper over the pattern of the _corolla_ shown in the picture on the next page.

(_b_) Cut out; and curl the tips of the petals, by drawing them through between the thumb and blade of the scissors, just as your mother does ostrich feathers.

2. Trace, through a piece of tracing paper, the _calyx_, and _foliage_, as shown in the picture. Cut out, and use for patterns in cutting green tissue paper calyx and leaves.

3. To make the _stamens_,—

(_a_) Cut three pieces of fine wire, two and a half inches long, for the _filaments_. (See picture of stamens.)

(_b_) Fasten a small yellow bead _anther_ on each end of the wire _filaments_, by bending the end of the wire over the bead with pincers. Fold the filament wires in half.

4. To make the _pistil_ and _stem_,—

(_a_) Cut a piece of heavy wire six inches long—to form the _stem_.

(_b_) On one end, fasten a large yellow bead to form the _stigma_. Cut a piece of fine wire eight inches long. One inch below the _stigma_ bead, hold the folded _filament_ wires in a little bundle around the stem wire, and wind with the fine eight inch wire—to form the _ovary_. The heavy wire between the _stigma_ and the _ovary_ represents the _style_.

5. Cut a piece of beeswax a little less than a half-inch square. Mould it with the fingers under hot water until you have a soft ball.

6. Slip the pink _corolla_ up the wire stem until over the wound wire. Spread the _stamens_ out to prevent the corolla from slipping off.

7. Fit the beeswax over the wound wire to form the _calyx_ cup; and pack a tiny bit of yellow tissue paper into the opening of the corolla _under the stamens_.

8. Wind the _calyx cup_ with the green tissue paper calyx which you cut by the pattern, and fasten the end with a tip of glue.

9. Run a fine wire in and out through the stems of the foliage.

10. Cut a piece of green tissue paper eleven inches long and one inch wide. Commencing at the green _calyx_ cup, wind the stem of the rose with this green strip of paper. Half way down, insert the _petiole_ of the foliage, or leaves, under the strip, and continue winding to the end of the stem. Fasten the end by winding with fine wire.

There! you have the flower, and you know the names of the parts as well as Billy and Mary Frances know them.