Bok Choy Roses

What you need:Bok Choy Roses
• Canvas
• Paint
• Bok Choy
• Cutting board
• Knife
•  Brush

What you do:
• Using the knife, cut off the bottom of the bok choy.
• The bok choy leaves  can be saved to make a dinner. (The closer to the bottom you cut, the tighter the “rose petals” will be.)
• Paint the back ground.
• Let it dry.
• Use the  brush to apply a light coating of paint to the cut side of the bok choy.
• Use this as a stamp to make roses on the canvas.
• Use green paint and the paint brush to make rose stems and leaves.
• When finished, wash off the paint from the bok choy and compost it.
• Let you artwork dry.
• Display!

3D Flower Art

What you need:3d flowers1
• Canvas
• Acrylic paint
• Egg carton
• Scissors
• Beads
• Green pipe cleaners
• Bow
• Tacky glue

What you do:3d flowers2
• Paint the egg carton white.
• Let it dry.
•  Cut  apart egg carton sections.
• Trim each “flower” to have petals.
• Paint the egg carton sections yellow and orange.
• Let them dry.
• Paint the canvas with any color of your choice.
• Let it dry.
• Trim pipe cleaners to the right length.
• Tie them together for a stem.
• Glue to the canvas with tacky glue.
• Glue a bead in the center of each flower.
• Glue the flowers to the canvas.
• Display!

DIY Hyacinthus

What you need:DIY Hyacinthus
• Paper
• Pencils
• Popcorn
• Tacky glue

What you do:
• Using pencils create a background.
• Draw a stem and leaves.
•  Glue popcorn above the flower stem, in a Hyacinthus shape.
• Display!

Maypole

What you need:
• Paper towel roll
• White construction paper
• Tissue paper streamers(different colors)
• Glue
• Scissors
 • Black marker
• Pencil

What you do:
• Lay the white construction paper flat and lightly spread glue down each of the long sides of the paper.
• Stick the paper towel tube on one side and roll it to the other. Smooth it out.
• Fold the paper inside the tube at both ends.
• With a black marker, make lines on your pole to resemble the birch tree.
• Cut some streamers in half the long way and glue around the inside of the top of the tube.
• Take a small square of tissue paper and crumple it on the end of a pencil.
• Put a dab of the glue on the end and press it to the top of your maypole.
• Repeat this process with various colors until you have a ring of flowers around the top.

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Flower Basket

What you need:
• Two paper plates
• Watercolor
• Brush
• Glue
• Scissors
Paper flowers

What you do:
• Color one plate with watercolor.
• Let it dry.
• Cut it in half.
• Keep one half for the front of the basket. (Recycle the other half, or save it for another basket.)
• Place the half-plate face up, as if you were going to eat from it.
• Cut away half of the inner part of the other paper plate, leaving the outer edge for a handle.
• Glue the lower edges of the paper plates together.
• Insert the paper flowers.
• This makes a basket full of flowers.

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Bird in a Cage

What you need:
• An assortment of construction paper
• String or crochet thread
• Double-sided tape
• Plastic lids (Hummus container works great!)
• Small beads
• Double-faced tape
• Scissors
• Pencil

What you do:
• Cut 12″ x 1/4″ strips of paper .You will need four strips per bird cage.
• In the center of each paper strip, make a tiny hole .
• Draw a bird on one of papers.
• Cut out your bird, and make a hole in the center of it’s back.
• Accordion-fold a piece of paper to create wings.
• Make a hole in the body of the bird and insert the wings.
• Cut a 14″ length of string. Tie your bird to the end of the string, and the tie a not in the string 1.5″ above the bird.
• Thread the string through the holes in your four paper strips. Slide them down the string until they meet the knot.
• Secure the strips together (just above the knot) by running a small bead through the holes.
• Run a strip of double-faced tape around the edge of the lid.
• Take your bundled strips, and fan them out like a starburst. Stick the ends of the strips to the edge of the lid, keeping them evenly spaced.
• Cut a strip of card stock 1.5 inches wide and long enough to wrap around the lid diameter. If your lid diameter is greater than the width of your paper, cut two strips.
• Wrap the strip around the tape-covered edge of the lid. Press down and smooth with your fingers.

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Spring Flowers

What you need:
• Styrofoam ball
• Q-tips
• Food coloring
•Bamboo skewer
• Scissors
• Glue
What you do:
• Cut the Q-tips in half
• Poke them into the Styrofoam ball.
• Once you are finished, mix up some water and food coloring.
• Roll the ball around in the food coloring until all the q-tips are evenly colored.
• Poke the bamboo skewer into the ball. You may want to secure it with a bit of hot glue.
• Display it.

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May Day Basket

What you need:
• Construction Paper
• Cellophane Tape
• Home-Made Flowers
• Scissors

What you do:
• Cut a triangle shape out of bright colored construction paper. Make the point flat. Roll the triangle into a cone shape and tape the 2 sides together. Trim off any extra paper around the top of the cone to make it even.
• Cut a strip of construction paper that is approximately 12-inches long by 2-inches wide. Tape this strip onto the top of your cone to make a handle.
• Now you can fill the basket with flowers and/or treats. You can make home-made flowers to fill your basket.
• Once your May Day cone basket is done, try to hang it on your neighbor’s doorknob without getting caught!

May Day

The origin of the May Day as a day for celebration dates back to the days, even before the birth of Christ. And like many ancient festivals it too has a Pagan connection.
For the Druids of the British Isles, May 1 was the second most important holiday of the year. Because, it was when the festival of Beltane held. It was thought that the day divides the year into half. The other half was to be ended with the Samhain on November 1. Those days the May Day custom was the setting of new fire. It was one of those ancient New Year rites performed throughout the world. And the fire itself was thought to lend life to the burgeoning springtime sun. Cattle were driven through the fire to purify them. Men, with their sweethearts, passed through the smoke for seeing good luck.
Then the Romans came to occupy the British Isles. The beginning of May was a very popular feast time for the Romans. It was devoted primarily to the worship of Flora, the goddess of flowers. It was in her honor a five day celebration, called the Floralia, was held. The five day festival would start from April 28 and end on May 2. The Romans brought in the rituals of the Floralia festival in the British Isles. And gradually the rituals of the Floralia were added to those of the Beltane. And many of today’s customs on the May Day bear a stark similarity with those combined traditions.
May day observance was discouraged during the Puritans. Though, it was relived when the Puritans lost power in England, it didn’t have the same robust force. Gradually, it came to be regarded more as a day of joy and merriment for the kids, rather than a day of observing the ancient fertility rights.

The tradition of Maypole and greeneries:
By the Middle Ages every English village had its Maypole. The bringing in of the Maypole from the woods was a great occasion and was accompanied by much rejoicing and merrymaking. The Maypoles were of all sizes. And one village would vie with another to show who could produce the tallest Maypole. Maypoles were usually set up for the day in small towns, but in London and the larger towns they were erected permanently.
The Maypole tradition suffered a setback for about a couple of decades since the Puritan Long Parliament stopped it in 1644. However, with the return of the Stuarts, the Maypole reappeared and the festivities of May Day were again enjoyed. One of the great Maypoles, was
The changes brought about by the Reformation included attempts to do away with practices that were obviously of pagan origin. But the Maypole, or, May tree, was not issued in practice at the behest of the second Stuart.
Although they succeeded in doing this, Maypole with most of the other traditions, many still survived. And Maypole is one of them. In France it merely changed its name. In Perigord and elsewhere, the May Tree became the “Tree of Liberty” and was the symbol of the French Revolution. Despite the new nomenclature, the peasants treated the tree in the same traditional spirit. And they would dance around it the same way as their forefathers had always done.

Maypoles and trees:
Trees have been linked to a part of celebration, perhaps, to the days ancient New Year rites. The association of trees to this celebration has come riding on the back of the spring festival in ancient Europe. Trees have always been the symbol of the great vitality and fertility of nature and were often used at the spring festivals of antiquity. The anthropologist E. O. James finds a strong relationship between the ancient tree related traditions of the British and the Romans. According to James’ description, as a part of the May Day celebration, the youths in old Europe cut down a tree, lopped off the branches leaving a few at the top. They then wrapped it round with violets like the figure of the Attis, the ancient Roman god. At sunrise, they used to take it back to their villages by blowing horns and flutes. In a similar manner, the sacred pine tree representing the god Attis was carried in procession to the temple of Cybele on Rome’s Palatine Hill during the Spring Festival of March 22.

Roots of May Day celebration in America:
The Puritans frowned on May Day, so the day has never been celebrated with as much enthusiasm in the United States as in Great Britain. But the tradition of celebrating May Day by dancing and singing around a maypole, tied with colorful streamers or ribbons, survived as a part of the English tradition. The kids celebrating the day by moving back and forth around the pole with the the streamers, choosing of May queen, and hanging of May baskets on the doorknobs of folks — are all the leftovers of the old European traditions.

May Day around the World.
May Day (May 1st) is celebrated in many places around the world. The traditions and stories surrounding May Day vary from place to place. There is, however, one thing that is similar in most celebrations – the use of Flowers!
One of the most popularly known May Day traditions is to hang a basket full of spring flowers and/or other small gifts on a neighbor’s doorknob. The trick is you don’t want the neighbor to see you! If you get caught, you are supposed to get a kiss.
In London, May Day is celebrated with the children going from house to house. They bring flowers and get pennies in return. The pennies are then thrown into a wishing well. The pennies are then donated to charity.
In France, cows play an important role in May Day. The cows are led in parades with many flowers attached to their tails. The people watching the parade try to touch the cows; it is believed to be good luck.
In Germany, one tradition is for boys to secretly plant a May tree in front of the window of the girl they love.
On May 1st, people in Hawaii celebrate their own version of May Day; they call it Lei Day. People give Hawaiian leis to each other. They put them around each other’s necks and sometimes give a traditional kiss.