Are you wondering why anyone would make a rosebush out of aluminum cans? Well, the truth is some of us (that would most assuredly include me) are challenged by this mysterious thing called gardening, and while flowers are usually cooperative with my limited skill set, there remain a few containers that will not sustain life. And my solution is to turn to trash because that’s like completely not weird, right?

If you need further evidence of my missing green thumb, I offer you my garden update. But in case you are new here, let me bring you up to speed.

I foolishly decided to try my hand at having a proper garden earlier this summer. So I dove right in with my little battalion of greenery, thinking I could command growth and obedience like a drill sergeant at Bootcamp. Not surprisingly, there were casualties.

However, there have been no additional fatalities since the loss of the strawberries, green beans, and lettuce early this summer. Still, tensions remain high, and no one is really in fighting shape.

The parsley has been taken captive, and their coded SOS messages have been garbled and unclear. Are they requesting additional water reinforcements, or are they signaling for some sort of air rescue to keep them from drowning? My enigma decoder machine is not working properly, and my command falters.

I was delighted when the tomato plants started producing and seemed to be my most vital little cadets. But now, they are in need of a triage unit that I am acutely unqualified to provide. So each day, I watch as something rots the helpless tomatoes on the vine.

The pepper plants have no peppers. The basil seems healthy but refuses to grow. The mint and oregano are stalky and sickly looking. The jalapeños have turned red, and well, call me crazy, but that doesn’t seem right.

Then in the ultimate act of insubordination, the romaine lettuce that I bragged about in a previous post turned on me. Almost overnight, it went to seed, shooting up to a spindly and unlettuce-like 3 feet tall. I can’t prove it because I don’t speak romaine, but I am pretty sure that this is their way of flipping me the bird.

All of this does call into question my fitness for duty, and I am expecting my dishonorable discharge papers any day now.

But seriously, let’s get on with the crafting, shall we?

Step 1 – Clean and Flatten Cans

You will need several cans for this project. For example, each full rose will use three cans, and each rose bud requires one can.

The first step is to clean, cut, and flatten the cans.

This short video will show you how I cut and flatten my aluminum cans for crafting.

Step 2 – Cut Petal and Leaf Shapes

To cut the roses, I used my Cricut cutting machine. The free SVG templates are at the bottom of this post. Or you can use the pdf template files if you want to try to cut them by hand.

This video will teach you how to cut Aluminum cans on a Cricut cutting machine.

Step 3 – Prep Leaves

Once all the pieces are cut, the next step is to prepare the leaves. I used an embossing tool to draw a line down the center of the leaves to add a bit 3-dimensional shape.

Next, I cut five-inch pieces of florist wire and glued them to the leaves with some E6000 glue.

Step 4 – Painting and Sealing

You can paint the pieces anyway you like, but I used copper spray paint and a simple paper towel technique with several of my acrylic paints.

Once the paint was dry, I added a sealer coat of DecoArt DuraClear gloss varnish.

The painting process is detailed in the video tutorial below. You will also find more information on shaping and assembling the roses.

Step 5 – Shaping

To make the rose, I used four strands of dollar tree wire cut to approximately 12 inches long and twisted them together at one end. Then I punched a hole in the center of all my petal pieces and strung them on the wire from largest to smallest.

Once all the pieces were on the wire, I made a knot at the top to hold the parts on and slid the smallest piece to the top.

I used some round-tipped jewelry pliers and my fingers to shape the petals. You can check the video tutorial for detailed instructions on shaping the rose.

Step 6 – Assembly

Once the roses were shaped, I added some leaves by twisting the wires together.

Next, I assembled the larger pieces similarly, wrapping the wires together. You can use florist tape to cover the wires if your flowers are inside. I have mine displayed outside, so I wrapped my branches with the green florist wire to finish them.

You can repeat this process as many times as you like to make a single rose or an entire rose bush.

Step 7 – Display

Happy Upcycling

Cindy

Free SVG Templates

Free PDF Templates

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