Chic Pumpkin: How To Make Rosettes

I was so excited when The Ribbon Retreat started carrying Vintage Ribbon and French Veil Netting!

I had to try them out so I decided to do something combining them both.
And with it being the Halloween season and all, I included a nice big pumpkin! 🙂

Vintage Ribbon is awesome! It is so soft, easy to manipulate, and great for all sorts of projects. I was specifically thinking how great it would be to embellish clothing with it. We carry 54 beautiful colors!

This French Veil Netting comes in 14 colors and is gorgeous! It was so fun to play with. It is great to use for embellishing hair accessories, headbands, flowers, hats, costumes, gifts, and for making birdcage veils. I can’t wait to use this in some hair accessories!

I first got the idea of painting a pumpkin in Blogland. Glitter spray paint is huge now and that’s what I intended to do. Imagine this pumpkin in bright sparkly ORANGE! But since it is so popular, all the stores were completely out of it. I was so disappointed. BUT I had some metallic spray paint left over, and I think I actually prefer this method over the sparkly spray paint. It gives my pumpkin a very chic feel!

Do you have a couple hours and want to make one for yourself??
It’s so easy, you’re going to feel so accomplished when it’s done in that short amount of time. 🙂

– Supplies –

Pumpkin
Spray Paint
Something to cover the stem such as paper or tape
Paintbrush
French Veil Netting
Vintage Ribbon
Embellishment such as pearl beads or rhinestones
Hot Glue Gun

First things first. Get a pumpkin. 🙂

I didn’t care about making this pumpkin last, so I just got a regular big pumpkin from the grocery store.
I just couldn’t spend over $20 on a big fake one when I could spend a few dollars on a bigger real one.
But if you want to use this pumpkin over the years, you just might want a fake one.

Wash your pumpkin if it’s a regular one. I just used a damp rag to get the dirt off.

Cover the stem with whatever you have so the paint only gets on the pumpkin.
I used painter’s tape. Make sure to completely cover the stem.
We are going to go back and paint the orange parts that didn’t get paint on it.

I painted my pumpkin outside.
This picture shows it being on the grass, but I actually moved it to the cement.
I needed a more flat surface so I could get the bottom of the pumpkin.
If you have enough paper down, the paint will not get on the cement.

The paint that I used was Krylon Brushed Metallic Paint, Champagne Nouveau.
I did two coats to give it an even finish.

While my pumpkin was drying, I make three ribbon rosettes using the Vintage Ribbon.
Just a big FYI, it is not like regular Grosgrain and sealing the ends with a lighter is not a good idea. 🙂
If you must seal your ends, use Fray Check or fold and sew.

Make a knot in the end of the ribbon.
Then fold the tail under the knot. Hot glue in place.

Now you are going to twist the ribbon and glue as you twist.
I generally do a few twists, put glue on the rosette, then put my twisted ribbon on the glue.
Continue doing this, going around and around.

This method is a little difficult to show in pictures, but if you play around with it, you’ll get it!
And there really is no perfect rosette; they are all different and beautiful!

As my rosette got bigger and bigger, I didn’t twist the ribbon as much.
I did smaller folds, and I did them less often.

Keep twisting and gluing until you like the size of your rosette.

When you’re finished, cut your ribbon and glue the tail under the rosette.

You’re almost done! 🙂

Now make two (or how ever many you want!) more.
I made mine smaller than the first.

You can either leave them like this or add an embellishment in the center.

I didn’t put any felt on the back since I was just hot gluing them to the pumpkin.
If you are using this method to make rosettes for accessories,
you will want to hot glue a felt circle on the back.
The Ribbon Retreat sells pre-cut felt circles in two different sizes. They are so nice!

Now that our rosettes are finished, we are going to go back to the pumpkin.

When you take off your stem cover, there will be some bright orange poking through where the paint missed. To get these parts, I spray painted a little paint on a paper plate. Then I used a small paintbrush to dab on those spots. It covered it up perfectly.

We are now going to put the French Veil Netting on our stem.
I wrapped it around the stem and tied it in a knot.
My stem was a little weird so I had to hot glue it down so the netting would stay lower on the stem.
You probably want to hot glue it down anyway.

After your netting has been placed. You can cut down the length of the netting if you wish.

Now place your rosettes on the stem/netting. Decide how you want them to be placed.

I started with my large rosette.
Put hot glue on the back and place it where you want.
I placed it over the knot in the French Veil Netting.

Glue on your other two rosettes.
I placed them slightly under the big rosette.

All done!
Easy and beautiful!