Klutz Fabulous Flowers review and giveaway

I love fresh cut flowers, but I'm horrible at taking care of them. With my chronic absentmindedness, I never seem to get around to changing their water and snipping off wilted leaves, and before I know it that lovely bouquet is droopy and dry. Alfie jokes that plastic flowers are more my style, but plastic flowers are tacky. If I'm going to go fake, I much prefer the bouquets of paper flowers that the kids make for me from time to time. For my birthday last month, Jammy folded me some lovely white irises, and I was really touched. His bouquet stayed up on our dining room table for several weeks before I put them in his art folder.

If only I had known about the new Klutz Fabulous Flowers! Klutz sent me a copy of their Fabulous Flowers kit, and the kids have been busy creating pretty paper blossoms. Suddenly I'm getting all kinds of belated Mother's Day bouquets, and we all couldn't be happier.


The Basics
About Fabulous Flowers

Let your creativity bloom with this book of can’t-go-wrong instructions for life-sized, dimensional, paper blossoms inspired by our favorite flowers: roses, daisies, daffodils, hibiscus, zinnias, cosmos, poppies, and larkspur. Sparkly embellishments, fresh paper colors, whimsical design variations, and a custom shaping tool give these blossoms a twist that’s pure Klutz — and quite possibly, even prettier than the real thing. As always, Klutz has packaged the book with everything you need to get started: 20 pages of ready-to-punch-out paper petals, sparkly flower centers, wrapped wire stems, glue, and of course, the custom winding tool — enough stuff to make bunches of flowers. Ages 8+ $19.99


Can't get enough of Fabulous Flowers? Klutz also sells a refill kit for $12.99:

Make 20 more paper flowers with an extra set of the same supplies that came with Fabulous Flowers: 26 sheets of punch-out flower petals and pieces, a shaping tool, rhinestone flower centers, wire stems, and glue.






The Bongga
Here's what I love most about Fabulous Flowers:

* The instructions are clear and easy to follow, with lots of helpful illustrations:
* The book comes with all the materials you need.

* The flowers are gorgeous! These go way beyond the regular tissue paper flowers that I taught my kids to fold years ago, which are already very pretty. You don't end up with a bunch of generic paper flowers; this book shows you how to make paper roses, zinnias, cosmos, larkspur, daisies and more. Each one is so distinct, and you can really tell what kind of flower each one is. Some of them even have glitter, which my kids love.

* The flowers are made out of sturdy printed cardstock, so they won't wilt or fade away! Check out my post-Mother's Day bouquet:



The Blah
The refill kit is kind of pricey, so my kids photocopied the punch-out flowers. Of course, the photocopy isn't as sturdy because it's just printer paper, as opposed to the nice, thick paper, and they'll have to cut out the petals instead of punching them out -- but it's an acceptable substitute, given the cost of the refill kit.


The Bottom Line
Keep your kids entertained this summer with Klutz Fabulous Flowers. Whether it's for a summer at-home camp, a road trip, a play date, a party craft or the occasional lazy summer afternoon, this book is a fabulous way to let your child's creativity blossom.


Win It!
Two lucky Bonggamom Finds readers will each receive a copy of Fabulous Flowers by Klutz!


Required Entry
To enter, simply visit the Klutz website, then leave a comment on this post and tell me which other Klutz books would catch your child's fancy. This entry must be completed before extra entries qualify.

Extra Entries
For extra entries, you can do any or all of the following. Please leave a separate comment for each extra entry with a way to verify the entry (i.e. tweet link, blog post link, Facebook id, Twitter id, etc.).

1) Sign up to be a Klutz Insider and leave a comment here telling me the email address you used to sign up.

2) Leave a comment on this post and tell me which of the eight different paper blossoms in Fabulous Flowers you would like your child to make for you (1 entry).

3) Subscribe to Bonggamom Finds updates (1 entry).

4) Follow Bonggamom Finds on Networked Blogs (1 entry).

5) Follow Bonggamom Finds on Blogger(1 entry).

6) Write this on the Bonggamom Finds Facebook page (1 entry):
I entered the Klutz Fabulous Flowers giveaway! http://ow.ly/5cEtV

7) Write this on the Klutz Books Facebook page (1 entry):
I entered to win a copy of Klutz Fabulous Flowers on Bonggamom Finds! 2 winners will be chosen on June 22 at http://ow.ly/5cEtV

8) Tweet this, up to once per day (1 entry per day, leave a comment with the tweet link for each tweet):
Two lucky winners will receive a copy of Fabulous Flowers from Klutz! Enter at @bonggafinds http://ow.ly/5cEtV #giveaways

9) Join any of the open giveaways on Bonggamom Finds (1 entry for every giveaway you've joined).


The Rules
This giveaway ends at 11:59PM PST on June 21, 2011; I will draw a winner at random on June 22 and post the winner's name after the winner confirms acceptance. Continental US residents only. For additional giveaway rules, click here. Good luck!

Disclosure: I received a copy of Fabulous Flowers to facilitate my review, but have not been paid to review the product or give my opinions. Product information is provided by Klutz and is indicated in italics. The views and opinions expressed here are my own.