Mother’s Day Forever Bouquet

Several Mother’s Days ago, I received a small wooden painted sign from my children. It reads:

That day, it brought me to tears, and it sits on my windowsill, where it catches my eye and is a never-ending reminder of how blessed I am to have the most amazing children whom I love dearly. Every year it is increasingly difficult to come up with unique gift ideas for my mom; after all, how many HomeGoods gift cards can one woman use?! (Well, in my case, I can never have enough of those, but I supposed that’s just me : ). Inspired by a gorgeous wedding bouquet that was created by a co-worker using vintage brooches and pins, I decided to make a “Forever Bouquet”. This floral forever bouquet uses only silk flowers, crystal pins and beads and any other embellishments you wish to add. Nothing to water and something that will last forever.

Here is the how-I-did-it: The supplies:

1. A glass vase or vessel. It can be transparent or not. You can actually use any style vase you would like, even a martini glass or mason jar! The options are only limited by your imagination!

2. Any crystal beads, barrettes, pins and buttons you wish to use to create your bouquet. It can be multi-colored or simple.

3. Florists foam, green florists tape plus any embellishments: rhinestones, lace doily, beads and a hot glue gun.

5. Faux flowers: again, any type. The base of my bouquet is one large white sparkly hydrangea, which I encircled  with roses and feathers and berries- all faux (faux sounds so much better than fake, am I right?!) I also used white, pink and green roses.

Simply take the vase and place the foam in the base and press down firmly.

I added a touch of bling by cutting a rope of rhinestones

and hot-gluing it to the middle of the vase.

To assemble the jewelry flowers, remove any backing (such as the barrette or the pin). Add a spot of hot glue to the middle of the underside of the flower.

Press cut stem into glue and hold until secured. When I cut the wood stems, I actually make the end rather jagged to give it better gripping power.

Wrap entire stem with florists tape. Repeat with as many sparkly blossoms you would like to use in your bouquet.

Now is the fun part! Start building your bouquet, beginning with the lace doily at the bottom of the vase.

This creates a base, much like a wedding nosegay. Next up was the one large sparkly hydrangea, to which I added a drop of glue to the base before I stuck it into the foam.

Added the feathers around the base, gluing each at the base and pressing them into place.

After that, I arranged the flowers. I am not a flower-arranging expert, so I am not going to instruct you in the proper techniques, only to say that you should make a “dome” effect of the bouquet. I wanted it to have a tightly-packed look, but you could certainly do a more woodsy, organic look as well.

I used primarily white flowers to really show off the jeweled blooms, but then added one pink rose in the center for a spot of color. Once my shape was complete and flower-filled, I started adding the jewelry flowers, one at a time, until the entire piece was completed. The final touches were some green berries and eucalyptus stems. There you have it!

A forever sign of love for your forever friend or mom to cherish. And, since I won’t be blogging on Sunday, I will just say Happy Mother’s Day to all of you!! And to my mom? Well, it goes without saying, Forever My Mother, For Always My Friend. XOXOX Susan