DIY Floral Fridge Magnets To Keep Shopping Lists & Decor Organized

You want to inject some verdant vibes into your kitchen, but you don't have the space for houseplants. Thankfully, there's an appliance in every kitchen that can showcase some greenery: the fridge. You might think flower-adorned fridge magnets don't number among the most exciting refrigerator trends. Those of us who love everything botanical strongly disagree. All you need to do to create a floral fridge magnet is to quill some flowers from paper strips (it's easy peasy!), create a fancy arrangement on cardstock, and stick a magnet on the back. Use your creation to proudly display family photographs, kids art, and to do lists.

A quilling kit, like the Beginner Quilling Kit from the U.S.-based Quilled Creations, is the easiest and cheapest way to create the flowers. At just $29.95, it won't break the bank. If you don't continue quilling, you could gift the kit to a friend or relative. Any old white craft glue will do. Decant it into a needle-nosed glue bottle for easy application. Walmart sells a six-pack of 1 ounce bottles for just under $10. We recommend starting with 3-inch diameter cardboard rounds — not too big or too small. Get a 12-pack of scalloped-edge white chipboard craft circles on Amazon for well under $20. This craft is relatively lightweight, so a 100 gauss or above magnet should be strong enough to hold it on the fridge. Hobby Lobby sells an eight-pack of 575 gauss 1-inch square adhesive magnets for a bit over $3.

Basic quilled flowers are made by sitting the quilling needle tool at one end of a thin strip of quilling paper, then turning the tool so that the paper winds tightly around itself. Make different types of blooms by cutting tiny slits into a paper strip or attaching strips of different colors and width end-to-end before winding the strip with your tool. Coiling strips with wavy or otherwise non-linear borders creates different forms, too. You can also pinch and push out finished coils to create different shapes.

Quilling is a craft with a history of techniques possbily dating back to Ancient Egypt and near-endless techniques to learn. If you really want to dive deep into this fascinating practice, head to your local library and borrow some books on quilling or visit a dedicated quilling craft website like The Paper Craftery or tutorials on U.K.-based TillyViktor.

Once your flowers dry, which will take about 15 minutes, adhere them to the card stock in any arrangement you prefer. It can help to mark out the arrangement you wish to create in pencil directly on the card stock before you get started. That way, you know where to place each bloom. Use tweezers to help you place tiny buds or leaves. Once again, leave the entire arrangement to dry completely. You don't want those wee flowers falling off! Finally, peel the paper off the magnet, revealing the adhesive surface, and stick it onto the back of the cardstock.

You can replace the quilled flowers with dried or artificial flowers made from plastic or silk. Amazon sells 120-piece bundles of mini silk blooms in assorted shapes and colors for less than $12. Prefer something more natural? Ask your local florist about dried options, or shop at an online florist like Charles Little & Company, where you can buy a bouquet of teeny white-petaled, yellow-centered daisies for $10. If you want to up the ostentatiousness, invest in this 120-piece set of vibrant mixed size, color, and style Millefiori glass flowers for under $12 at Walmart. Many faux flowers — of any material — won't have the flat bases of their quilled counterparts; use a general purpose super glue to stick them to the cardstock.

Think even further outside the box (or the kitchen junk drawer) and add some up-cycling into the mix. We all have that collection of tacky tourist gift shop buys we're too embarrassed to plaster the fridge with. Covering them with miniature blooms could be a handy way to repurpose those magnets around your home. You could also use cardstock in shapes other than round or made of materials like wood to create more visual interest or suit existing decor. What's more, these fridge magnets make a creative housewarming gift that any person will love — from the garden girly to the proud flower-obsessed bro in your life.