Plantable Seed Paper Valentines

I meant to post this last week, and never got to it.   We had some fun a couple of weeks ago making recycled paper.  We added bits of red yarn scraps, which made the paper a nice pinkish hue, and we mixed in 4 packets of wildflower seeds (after the pulp was blended, not before!) so that our paper could be used to make our Valentine's cards and then planted in a pot by the recipient to grow their own flowers.  I was a little skeptical that the seeds would sprout, so we planted some paper scraps in our pots as an experiment - and - up came the little baby flower sprouts.  So - success!

This is a great project for children - especially littles who like to tear paper to bits and shreds.  (ahem - like my littles - who looked at me questioningly when I asked them "would they please rip up this stack of paper from our recycling bin into the smallest pieces they possibly could."  When Johann was sure I meant what I said - he happily occupied himself ripping and ripping for quite a while)

We made the seed paper by

1. Ripping up paper we found in our recycling bin at home

2. Soaking the paper bits in water and letting them sit overnight

3. Pureeing the bits in a blender,

4.   Stirring in 4 packets of wildflower seeds with a spoon

and then

5.   Spreading out the puree on a screen to dry in front of a fan.  (the paper puree needs to be spread as thin as possible on the screen so that it can dry as quickly as possible) 

            

-  When the paper was dry, we cut it into circles, and glued it to the center of each of some cardstock flowers, along with a little stick for the flower stem, and a note telling his friends how to plant the seed paper later.

The boys had such fun pushing the button on the blender and watching their paper shreds turn into a pulpy goo that they have requested we make paper again next weekend.  So we may be diving back into our paper recycling bin for another batch soon!