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While most people use a heavy book to press flowers, one year for Christmas my dad made each of us “real” flower presses.
These are easy to make, simple to use, and you can do stacks of flowers at the same time.
What you will need for making each flower press, 2 pieces of wood 10 x 7, and 1 inch thick (although you can make the dimensions however you wish, I am using mine for a guide), 4-3 inch x 1/4 inch bolts with wing nuts to fit. Several sheets of cardboard and some plain paper.
Make sure that your pieces of wood are well sanded, my dad even used a router on the outside edges of both the top and bottoms of the presses that he made. Next, set your boards on top of each other, making sure that all edges are even. Using a drill press with a rather long bit drill holes, 1 inch in and 1 inch down, from each corner (check and make sure that the holes you are drilling will fit the bolts that you have gotten. The holes should be just a tiny bit bigger than the actual bolt.) Drilling both pieces of wood at the same time will make sure that the holes will line up perfectly when running the bolts through.
Using the cardboard and the paper, cut each to fit inside of the bolt holes in the wood. They should be about 1 1/4 inches smaller, than the boards. Or you can also just trim the corners. On the bottom board, stack 1 piece of cardboard, 2 pieces of paper, 1 piece of cardboard, 2 pieces of paper. Keep repeating these steps until you have a decent amount of cushioning to your press. Now add your top layer of wood. Put the bolts up through the holes, now add your top layer of wood, lining up the ends of the bolts to the holes, and then screw on your wing nuts.
That is all there is to it!
Now to dry and press flowers. Pick your flowers a little later in the day after the dew is off of the petals. Open the press back up, leaving the bottom and a sheet of cardboard along with a piece of paper. Now add several flowers, making sure they are not touching each other, now place a piece of paper, then another sheet of cardboard on top. If you are adding more flowers, next add a sheet of paper on top of the cardboard, add the flowers. Top with more paper and cardboard.
Just keep repeating the layers, cardboard, paper, flowers, paper, cardboard, paper. You always want to make sure you have paper next to your flowers to catch any moisture, and cardboard between each layer to keep the flowers from imprinting on each other. (If your paper gets stained, replace it with fresh paper.)
Lastly add your top piece of wood, run the bolts up through and screw on the wing nuts. Tighten down as much as possible, every day or so, you can go back and tighten a little more. Particularly if you are pressing flowers such as roses or any other bulky flower.
Check your flowers after several days to check for dryness, and when dry remove. These can be used in a variety of craft projects, and can be stored in a box separated with tissue paper until needed.
Once you see how quick and easy these are to make, you will be making several for yourself and for each of your friends and family. Although won’t it be rather sad to open a book and not have flowers falling out?
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