Recycled Cherry Blossom Tree

We have an big old cherry tree in our garden that blooms late in spring with huge heavy dark pink blossoms. The petals then drop (all at once it seems) and create a bed of pink on the ground.

I've been struggling to come up with an idea of what to do with our tree since Easter. Then with seeing all the trees and flowers coming in to bloom it gave me a thought - we should make our own cherry blossom tree.

For this project I used recycled tissue paper. For those of you that read my posts regularly I am a total stickler for collecting anything that might be recycled or reused. Tissue paper from gifts is carefully stored away to be used again. Having just had our Princess Party I had a good stack of pink tissue paper to hand. 

I cut circles from the tissue paper (not precise cutting needed.) I then crumpled 4 layers of tissue paper together - the more crumpled the paper the more texture the flowers have - which is why second hand tissue paper was perfect for this project.

I flattened out the circles again and then cinched the middle of the circle together with a ribbon. I did use some recycled ribbon for this project too but I also used 1/8" ribbon that I found for 59c on sale at JoAnn.

Bunny #1 liked to crumple the tissue and cut the ribbon but sadly she grew tired of the repetitive nature of this project. For our next tree project I will have to remember the 'little 3 minute projects filled with glitter gems' rule!

All of the finished flowers lying together already looked tempting. 

I then tied all the flowers to the branches of our tree securing with little bows behind each flower.

Our tree has blossomed for the Spring.  

Despite being bored of making the flowers (I made 90 in total!) the girls are enchanted with the tree. And my eldest did enjoy making this happy little caterpillar who is now living in its branches.

You can read more about our tree project on these posts:
Swedish Easter Tree
Valentine Tree