Hi there. Thanks for checking out what I made last week for my Creative Challenge . It’s a bouquet of crochet flowers with wired stems and leaves, so they can be bent into shape to make a nice bouquet.
I’ve written out the pattern but please be warned that this is rough. If you know how to crochet, I’m pretty sure you’ll know what I mean, but if not, these instructions might not be clear enough. If you have problems, please email me at the address in the blog footer and I’ll try to help.
I used a package of cotton mini skeins of thin yarn for the flowers but any yarn of your choice will work. Each flower takes 4 colours of yarn but you can reduce that to two if you want, one colour for the middle ring and another for the rest.
For the stems and leaves, I used thin black crafting wire. The thread is very thin crochet cotton (meant for doilies) because that is what I had on hand, so I used double thickness because it was too thin to use a single thickness. Ideally, you’ll find some green yarn that is the same thickness as what you used for the flowers.
The centre of the flowers is a vintage blue glass bead but any bead that is large enough not to easily slip through the centre hole of your flowers will do. It’s the bead that holds the flower onto the stem. There’s also a small disk of green felt on the backside of the flower, to hold it in place from the back.
Small crochet flowers
Flower : ch 3. Into 1st ch make 11 hdc. close ring with slip stitch. Cut yarn.
change colour. into front loop of previous hdcs , “slip, double, slip” into each stitch, repeat 11 more times (12 in total). cut yarn.
change colour. turn work over and attach to back loop of hdcs from previous row. working from the back (ie: it’s backward when looking at the front) ch 3, 1 treble into base of chain. 2 trebles in each stitch around. 24 trebles. close ring with slip. Finish with one chain, cut yarn and pull through so work doesn’t unravel.
change colour. turn work back over so you’re looking at the front again. attach with slipstitch. You’re going to make scallop “petals” all around. skip one stitch, 5 doubles into next, skip 1 stitch, anchor with slip into next. 6 petals around. Cut yarn and weave in all ends.
Leaves : measure wire – 2 x “length you want leaf plus stem part to be plus about 1/2 inch”
Make slip stitch leaving at least 4 inch tail. Attach thread with single crochet over both wires. Going toward fold, make 12 sc stitches along wires. Push all the way to fold in wire. At fold, make 5 sc into one wire, going around fold. 12 sc stitches along the other side, over both wires and between stitches on other side. ch 2 sl into first stitch on other side.
3 sc, 3 hd, 4 d, 2hd, singles around end stitches. Reverse order on other side. Single crochet over both wires and beginning tail ends.
Leaf Stem : 15 single crochet stitches over both wires and beginning tail ends (to hide them), for longer leaf stem or 7 for shorter. Leave a long piece of yarn as a tail and cut without finishing (leave last loop open, you’ll pick it up again later).
↑ Parts to make a complete flower. (I know this is a terrible photo but it gives you an idea of how things look.)
Flower stem : Cut a piece of wire 2 times the length you want stem plus about 1 inch. Fold in half and slide a bead that is larger then middle hole of flower (the bead holds the flower on the wire. Slide cut ends of wire through hole in flower. Cut a circle of green felt about 1/2 inch across. Centre on cut end of wire and poke through. Slide that along wires until snug against flower.
Make slip stitch with crochet thread, leaving at least 4 inch tail. Attach to wire stem with a slip stitch, pushed right next to the felt. Single crochet along stem for as long as you want before attaching the leaf.
To attach leaf : Line leaf stem and flower stem together. Insert hook through loops on both flower stem and leaf stem (the one you left open before). Using long tail you left on leaf stem and crochet thread still attached to flower stem together (double thickness) single crochet over all 4 wires, all the way to the end of stem, covering tail ends within stitches. Clip any end of yarn that weren’t hidden under the single crochet stitches.
At the end, to avoid any pokey wire ends, trim ends of wire to even length, fold them up about 1/2 inch and sc over one thickness of wire to cover. You’ve formed a small loop which you can just press together to close. Finish with a few single crochets over all 4 wires and previous single crochets on stem. Cut and weave in ends.
↑ What the back of the flowers look like, with the disk of green felt. ↑
↑ I also made a couple of leaf pairs to fill out the bouquet. ↑
Here’s wishing you a good week, and happy crafting if you, too, are into making things.
xo loulou
