Quilled Cactus

This quilling project is inspired by the stuffed cactus I made last year. This post contains affiliate links. 

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Quilled Cactus

Materials:

• white cardstock
• copy paper (green, yellow, pink)
• microtip scissors
• 1" heart punch
• 3 mm quilling paper (green, yellow, pink)
• quilling tool
• fine-tip craft glue
• reverse tweezers
• mini easel

Steps: 

Cut the white cardstock to the desired size for the background (mine is 4.25" x 5.5"). Cut a trapezoid from the yellow copy paper to make the front of the pot. Cut a curved arc the same width as the top of the trapezoid to make the back of the pot. Use the green copy paper to cut out the cactus. I did one large oval and two smaller ovals. Glue these to the cardstock background. 

Punch a heart from pink copy paper and glue it to the pot. Now it's time to start quilling. Begin by outlining the main part of the cactus in green, then outline the arms. Add two vertical ribs. Outline the pot with yellow. 

Now fill in the cactus with a combination of loose circles and other shapes. If you look closely, you'll see I used some teardrops and a marquise. There's no right or wrong. I didn't glue anything in until I'd completely filled the area. Once I liked how it looked, I used reverse tweezers to remove one circle at a time so I could add glue and return it to the correct spot. 

Finally, use pink quilling paper to make 6 tight circles and a heart. Glue the circles next to the arms and the heart directly over the punched heart shape.  

Display your design on an easel.

Once you know the basics of quilling, you can apply them to literally any design you'd like to make.