Friday, February 12, 2021

Easy DIY Pop-Up Bouquet: Free Cricut Templates & Tutorial

John and I are in a community group delivering Valentines to retirement homes this weekend, so I've been looking for cute-but-easy pop-up cards we could make on our Cricut.

I thought this would be an easy find, but WOW was it not. o.0 Nearly all the cards I found were either too complicated to make in multiples, had their "free" templates locked behind membership paywalls, or were on blogs so old that the template files were missing. So after a frustrating hour, I asked John to help me make our own templates.

Aaaaand here's what we came up with:

Cute, right? I like how the flowers grow as you open the card.

 I also like that the design is all-occasion friendly, because I will for sure be making more of these throughout the year.

To give proper credit where it's due: I believe the flower pop-up part originated on this Instructable - but it's so old all the graphics and video are gone. It's by far the most common design I found on Pinterest and Youtube, though:

From what I've seen all of these versions are hand cut and use a single layer of paper for the flowers. We changed ours up by adding a second layer for the flower stamens, designing templates we can cut on our Cricut, and by making the card itself as a print file.

With the machine doing all the cutting - and no need to hand draw the flower centers OR the outside card - these come together pretty fast! We've been able to whip up over a dozen in a single evening.



Ready to see how? Then here, watch me put one together in under 4 minutes:



And of course you get all our templates for free. Get ready to clicky-click!

The Cricut cut file:


Click to embiggen, then right-click and save to your desktop.

And for those of you who don't have a Cricut, we've got you covered, too:



Print this right onto your colored paper, then cut by hand. Just remember, you want colorful paper for this part, not card stock.

And here are the print files:




I also asked John to make a couple more option for the front, since I know "You Are Loved" sounds a little impersonal. (We're giving ours to strangers, that's why.)




Print this on white or light colored card stock, both front and back, and you'll get two cards per sheet.

Also let me save you some time: both JoAnn's and Michael's don't carry colorful paper. All they have is kids' construction paper and card stock. (I know, I couldn't believe it either!)  So we trekked over to Staples and got this AstroBrites pack, which comes with 150 sheets in 25 different colors:




This cost us $15 at Staples, but you can get the same pack on Amazon for $7. So... yeah, do that instead. :D

Picking your flower colors is the fun part: you can choose all one color with a contrasting center:


Which looks like this:


Or mix two colors together:


Or, if you're feeling ambitious, go for THREE colors:



I even did a few with four colors. Have fun! Mix and match!

If you make a lot of cards at a time you'll get the added bonus of a colorful art installation on your work table:

::hand flourish:: ART.

You can see ours had Suki extremely mildly interested:



That's the face of a cat debating if it's worth scooching forward a few inches.

"Ehhhhh... nah, I'm good."

(It's not so much that our cats are well behaved as they're just so comfortable.)

I hope you'll remember this the next time you feel like paper crafting! Be sure to save those templates up there for the next time you need a cute card - or be like us, and whip up a few now to give out as Valentines this weekend.


31 comments:

  1. Looks great: thanks for the non-Cricut option! It's on my "maybe someday" list but I'm definitely not there now.

    Might I suggest a third front? "Thank you" would also work nicely there. :D

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    1. Ohhh, you're totally right! I'm going to ask John to send me a "thank you" option right now!

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    2. Thanks bunches. :D

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  2. I JUST bought myself a Cricut Explore Air (after having owned a Cricut Create) and am having SO MUCH fun!! This is perfect. I can't wait to make some.

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  3. SUKI the Supervisor is on duty!

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  4. Wow, those are fantastic! I don't know how you figured out how to cut and glue them all together - that looks like major mental ninja magic!

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  5. I just love watching you open them all on video

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  6. As of last March, Michael's did carry the astrobrite packs (near construction paper and science fair display boards). Looks like it's been discontinued since then. So, check the clearance aisle-you may find a deal!

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  7. Those are wonderful! I've always been a sucker for pop-up cards, especially colorful clever ones like this. Knowing how to make them is a gift!

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  8. These are so great! I might make some today! I've been wanting to send some happy mail to my friends since I don't get to see them in person much right now. Sadly, the Thank you version is not showing up as clickable. :(

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    Replies
    1. Whoops, Blogger pulled a switcheroo on that one, sorry! Fixed it now.

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  9. Check out https://www.extremepapercrafting.com/2008/05/seven-flower-pop-up-card.html :)

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  10. How are these folded and glued together? They look great!

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    1. Ohhhhh thanks. Missed that somehow ��‍♀️

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  11. I love this so much! Thank you! I also LOVE the video tutorials. I love following your tutorials but sometimes get lost with just pictures. The video helps so much! 🌸🌸🌸

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  12. The video came up on the Instructable when I went to the URL links in the article; the embedded video is dead as you say. No template, though.

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    1. Oh good, glad the links work, at least! I didn't think to check those.

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  13. I am here, too. I just cut the words “fat pig” into my stomach with an x-acto knife. I know exactly what it feels like when you use pain to make things go away.

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    1. This comment hits like a gut-punch, Holly. I'm so sorry, I don't know your pain, but I can only imagine the despair that drives you to scar yourself this way. Do you have someone to talk to? Please reach out to someone you trust. Please. If you need a little moral support, DM me. You are worthy of love. You are worthy.

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  14. Thanks for the great tutorial. I followed the directions to download and upload, but Cricut said it was not a supported file. Can you help? thanks Julie

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    1. Hmm, we made the Cricut template a .png, so that *should* be supported. Maybe make sure it downloaded as a .png to your desktop? Sometimes my own system like to change the file type.

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  15. Thanks it worked today. Sometimes I am computer challenged.

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  16. Do you have a written tutorial I need something I can follow step by step

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  17. Awesome tutorial, love it. Thank you for sharing it 😍🤩!!

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  18. I followed everything on the pop up to a tee. But when I open my card it always pulls lose from one side as if the bouquet is not big enough. What am I doing wrong. I have did it over so many times I am exhausted.

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    1. Oh no, I'm sorry it's giving you so much trouble! It sounds like your glue isn't strong enough; the bouquet shouldn't pull loose at all, as it needs to pull pretty hard to open the flowers up all the way. If you haven't already, try a glue dot; those are extra sticky and strong.

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  19. Thanks for the great tutorial! It seems like some people are had difficulty opening the file. I put it into SVG format, here is a link for anyone that wants it. Each piece is a separate item in the file, so you an easily hide some if you only want to cut a few of one color.

    https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Xare5gVNBAJ2VAdZfdewjuwT0V3SIqYZ/view?usp=sharing

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  20. How big is the card? do you have an envelope pattern for it?
    Thanks

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  21. What am I doing wrong? The printed part is coming out tiny, like the finished card will be about 3 inches by 4 inches. Ive tried everything I can think of, HELP!

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    Replies
    1. Hmm. When you saved the templates, did you click the graphics first to enlarge them? It's possible you saved the thumbnail size.

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