Feel the power of the [Light] Crystal Boutonnieres!

Wow! Check out those crystal boutonnieres made by OBT member AmandaCaleb I bet you want to know how to make them now. Well, here's Amanda with her post on how to make these. And do forgive me for all the Dark Crystal references. -Megan

We are not having a florist or flowers at our wedding, so for a long time I didn't know what to do for the boutonnieres. Now that I have made them, I like them so much I decided to make a tutorial!

The materials needed are:

• A lapel pin vase
• Crystals [Editors Note: The Shard!]
• High temperature hot glue and gun
• Crayola Model Magic clay
• Ribbon in your wedding colors (this is optional, but I needed to bring some color into these so I used it on mine)

Now here's how I did it:

If you are putting a ribbon on your lapel pin, do that first because it will make it easier to hold the pin later when you put the hotglue on the inside. I made a short line of glue slightly narrower than the ribbon on the back of the pin, stuck on one end of the ribbon, then put more glue over the end I just glued so that the free end can wrap around to meet the glued end.

Make a small ball out of the clay, approximately 1cm in diameter. Make one end a little pointy to fit into the pin (this doesn't need to be very precise). Hold the pin upright and try to get a little hotglue to run down inside along the inner wall to make the clay stay in better. Use the eraser end of a pencil (I used a spare crystal) to shove the clay into the inside of the pin. Don't get the clay too near to the top because more glue is going there.

Once the clay is inside arrange your objects in the pin, the clay will get dents in it where you want them to go. Then take the objects out. Put a layer of hotglue over the clay, making sure the glue touches the inner wall of the pin on all sides like a plug. Quickly put your objects into the glue and clay before the glue cools. When the glue cools you may want to put more hotglue in the crevices between your objects and the pin for stability. Once the glue cools you are done.

I think this method would work for any small phallus shaped objects, therefor this tutorial could be used for non-crystal boutonnieres as well. Some other options that I have thought of are; crayons, paintbrushes (cut off part of the handle), drill bits, candy canes, or doll parts and accessories.