In your stash, perhaps you have paper with colors or prints you adore, but have a hard time finding a way to use as a background or a larger piece. Or maybe you have some scraps from your favorite prints that you hate to throw out. One way to make sure your favorites still beautifully grace a layout is to tear strips of the paper and turn them into flowers. This is an inexpensive, fun way to decorate a page, even if you don't normally consider yourself a do-it-yourself accent maker (or if you do!).

Love, the Baker by Kim Watson, as seen in Scrapbooking Tips and Tricks: Texture, p. 89.

Kim Watson not only made lovely flowers from paper strips, she gave them extra pizazz by layering smaller flowers on top of larger ones and finishing off with a decorative center. You can too! Just follow the steps below.

1. Tear 1 1/2" and 1" wide strips of patterned paper against a metal die or ruler.

2. Loosely pleat each strip, adhering the ends together to form a circle.

3. Adhere both pleated circles to cardstock circle with hot glue. Press button into center and let dry.

For a softer look, make torn flowers from tissue paper or crate paper. For a little see-through flaire use vellum. For a two-tone look, use ColorCore cardstock. Whatever way you tear it, have fun!

--Dorathy Gilchrist, associate editor