Picked at their peak and then preserved, pressed botanicals enable you to enjoy summer's beauty long after its blooms have faded from the garden. Today, Martha uses a variety of pressed flowers, including bridal wreath, Queen Anne's lace, blue and red verbena, and yellow and purple violas, to create charming stickers that are ideal for embellishing note cards, envelopes, or gift tags. When selecting your flowers, keep in mind that intensely hued blooms with flat bottoms, such as pansies, violets, and verbena, press especially well. Although Martha uses pre-pressed blossoms for this project, you can easily press yours at home, using little more than waxed paper and an ordinary phone book.

Tools and Materials
Always handle pressed flowers with care; they're fragile and can tear easily.

Flowers
Scissors
Waxed paper
Large, heavy book, such as a telephone book
Tweezers
Sheets of clear stickers
Note cards, envelopes, or gift tags

Pressed Flower Stationery How-To
1. Begin by selecting your flowers: Gather clean, blemish-free specimens on a sunny day when they aren't wet from rain or dew.

2. Snip flowers' stems close to the base, or leave them on their stems, as desired; place flowers between two pieces of waxed paper and press, facedown, in the book. Close, and weight the book. Leave undisturbed. After a week to 10 days, open the book slowly, and you'll find papery pressed flowers.

3. Place the stickers down, sticky side up, on a dust-free surface. Select a flower, and using the tweezers, carefully transfer it, face down, onto the center of the sticker. Press down, and stick.

4. Use the stickers to decorate note cards, envelopes, or gift tags. Keep in mind that pressed botanicals will fade naturally over time, but keeping them out of direct sunlight will delay fading.