$5 Spring Decor

The answer for me, was yes i was up to the challenge? what was the challenge? Living with Lindsay challenged followers to create a spring decor item for $5 using items only purchased at the dollar stuff. with the exception of paint, glue, paper, fabric, tools which could only be used if already on hand. With a little inspiration from Disney (who’s blog i follow) and Jesi (a friend who’s blog i also follow) i designed my spring decor….

Paper bag flowers in a newly beaded/painted vase! Total cost $4-5

Making it is simple…. So Let’s get started and head to the dollar store for our supplies:

1) Package of Brown lunch bags

2) Mardi gra beads (mine came in an 8 pack)

3) Glass vase (the one i choose was very plain and smooth which made it easy to paint and glue on but if your daring any drinking glass or vase would work)

4) pipe cleaners

5) optional: Rocks, sand, styrophome balls, or the green flower foam to anchor the flowers.

Now let’s head home and get started… Pull out your tacky glue, paint of choice, and scissors and your ready to start making your vase and flowers…

We are going to start with the vase first, because it needs to dry. (i am going to tell you how i did mine, but keep in mind you can do step 4 before steps 1-3)

Vase:

1) clip one strand of mardi gra beads so that it is one long strand and not a necklace.

2) start gluing the strand to the brim of the vase (i put a little bit of glue on each bead and then stuck it to the vase. continue to do so until you have reached the beginning and then trim off excess beads.

3) One the glue is done drying your going to paint your vase, beads and all, per the instructions on the paint bottle.

In between waiting for each of above wet steps to dry let’s work on the flowers…

1) Take out two paper bags and trim off the bottom of the bag and then cut down the side folds so each bag is cut into two separate pieces.

2) Layering the now four sides on top of each other begin fan folding (you remember folding paper fans when you were in school…)

3) Take one pipe cleaner and wrap it around the center of your folded bags

4) Begin opening up your flower. To do this you are going to separate each layer of bag pushing it towards the center as you do this

5) Once all the layers are separated and folded towards the center, you may need to fiddle with the layers to make it look a bit more like a flower (think fake christmas tree here and how you have to adjust branches). I kinda pinched the bottom of flower to make it a little rounder and make everything a bit closer together..

6) Once your flower has taken shape the way you would like you can move onto the next. You can also cut open the bottoms of the bag so they are flat pieces and repeat steps 1-5 to make smaller flowers.

Now you are ready to put the two together…

1) check paint is dry and as thick as you desire

2) Fill vase with anchor as you feel necessary (i used rocks to anchor my flowers to do so i simply filled the vase first with the rocks and then began placing the pipe cleaner stems into the rocks.) If you used a taller vase or one with a skinnier mouth you may not need the anchor/filler

3) arrange flowers in the vase (once my flowers were arranged i used some rocks which i had left out and strategically placed them to hold the flowers where i desired.

Don’t forget to stop and smell the flowers, and if you make some of your own please share!

*** Post also linked to Fireflies and Jelly Beans***