 Scrapbooking with dried
leaves
by Paula Pierce
Through the ages leaves have been dried or preserved for many different
reasons. Some leaves were dried for medicinal purposes, some for teas and
tobacco and others for fragrances. Recently, dried leaves have really caught
on as a decorative element in scrabooking. Small dried leaves are great as
embellishments or placeholders and larger dried leaves make great
backgrounds for your scrapbooking pages.
In
this article we are going explore the different methods for drying leaves.
We will compare different techniques to figure out which ones suck and which
ones work. We'll look at the scrapbooking applications for dried leaves and
we'll also provide you with some great links to learn more. Lets get
started.
The easiest and most popular way of drying leaves is by folding a paper
towel or tissue paper around your leaf and placing it in between two thick
books. Let it sit for a week or two and presto! dried leaf.
Well, I see 2
problems right off the bat with this method. #1 it's slow, and #2 it's
boring. NEXT!
How about sand preserving leaves. Maybe this will give us the instant
gratification we desire. Sand preserving leaves involves placing your leaves
in a pan, covering them with dry, hot sand, and then allowing it to cool so
you can remove the leaves and smooth them out with a hot iron before dipping
them in a colorless varnish and letting them dry.
Okay, this one sounds like it may be fun to try, even though it's about 10
more steps than the book method, however it's almost winter here in Utah and
dry, hot sand is not abundant at the moment. Let's see what else we have.
Try
placing a leaf between two pieces of wax paper and then covering it with an
old towel or rag.
Press the fabric with a warm iron, sealing the wax paper together with
the leaf in between. Cut your leaves out, leaving a narrow margin of wax
paper around the leaf edge. This will keep the leaf sealed from the air and
speed up drying time. Depending on what type of leaf you use, you may be
able to open the wax paper in only a few days. Ahah,
Now were getting somewhere. But just to be fair, let's hear what the
microwave has to say about drying leaves.
Take some leaves and place
them in the microwave on some paper towels. Now place a few paper towels on
top of them as well. Start the microwave and let the leaves cook for 30
seconds to a minute and a half. The drier the leaves, the less time they
will need to cook. You must be very careful because it is possible for the
leaves to catch on fire. So start off with 30 seconds at a time. And if your
microwave has 1-10 power settings, you want to be running on power 4. If the
leaves curl after removal, they have not been dried enough.
If the leaves are scorched, they were left in too long. Let the leaves dry for a day or
two, then finish the leaves with a sealant, such as an acrylic craft spray.
This method seems simple enough, paper towels and
microwave. But wait, this just in...
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