The Definitive Guide to Flower Emoticons

For those of you who jockey a keyboard all day long, this is the post for you!

The first internet-era emoticons (pronounced: ee-moh-tee-kahn) made their debut in 1982 with the simple, yet effective, :-) and :-(. These timeless icons were meant to distinguish jokes from serious statements, and still do. Now, countless text combinations exist to express almost every human emotion.

Emoticons (and emojis) have even made their way into business use. I've seen a few companies incorporate emoticons in their emails and newsletters, which brought to my mind a number of questions--How do I do that? Are there flower emoticons? Is it a complicated combination of letters and numbers? Do I need to download a program? Does everyone just copy and paste?

After some research, I have found the way to flower emoticon bliss, and would like to share my findings with you! As long as all your keyboard ducks are in a row, incorporating emoticons into your emails and posts can be done in 2 easy steps:

Step 1: While holding down your keyboard's ALT button, enter the code (listed below) of the flower symbol you want to make, using the numeric keypad keys. Be sure to hold down the ALT key the entire time.

Step 2: After typing in the code, release the ALT key. Voila! Your lovely flower emoticon should appear. Can you see it? If not, don't fret; keep reading to find a solution.

List of Codes
10042	✺
10043	✻
10044	✼
10045	✽
10046	✾
10047	✿
10048	❀
10049	❁
10051	❃
10058	❊
10059	❋

Troubleshooting Questions:

1. Are you using the numeric keypad? This is essential when entering emoticon codes, as using the top line of numbers will not work.

2. Is the "Num Lock" button enabled on your keyboard? "Num Lock" is the button located on your keyboard's right side (where the numeric keypad resides). Be sure this is activated!

3. Have a Mac? Instead of pressing down the ALT key, you will use the OPTION key. Some other codes may require you to press both the OPTION and SHIFT key simultaneously.

4. Working on a laptop? If your computer or laptop lacks a numeric keyboard, no problem! Every keyboard has a "hidden" numeric keypad (see image below) which makes letters act as numbers with the pressing of the "Num Lock" button.

4. Are you holding down the ALT button the wholetime?

5. Still having troubles? If you try all of these solutions and your emoticons are still not appearing, explore even more troubleshooting options here).

❁

Now you can ornament your digital life with flowers! Have fun and play around with various codes and number combinations to see what other emoticons are out there. I found these adorable icons below just by typing in random numbers: