Made for Monday ~ A Fall Topiary!

Hi everyone! Hope everyone is having a great Labor Day weekend. Mine has been pretty good. We were able to go the local flea market this morning, but unfortunately I didn't find any treasures to bring home with me. Well, I did find some but it seemed like they were asking for an arm and a leg for everything. So I came home and decided to do some crafting! I have been seeing fall topiaries all over blogland and decided I wanted to try to make one myself. I had all the supplies I needed except for the flowers, the styrofoam ball, and the foam for the vase. All the other stuff I already had in my craft stash. I am very pleased with the way it turned out!



Here is how I did it:

First I gathered all my supplies together. I used a small terra cota vase that had been whitewashed, some floral foam, a 4 inch styrofoam ball, 2 bushes each of 3 different colored flowers, some moss, 4 small dowel rods, twine, and some scrap ribbon.



Next, I cut some of the floral foam and inserted it firmly into my vase. You could hot glue this down, I suppose, but I didn't.



Then I took my 4 dowel rods, gathered them together in a bunch and ran a bead of hot glue down between each dowel.



Then I took my twine and wrapped it around the rods, leaving about an inch or so exposed at the top and bottom.



The next step was to insert one end of the dowels into the foam in my vase and attach the foam ball into the top end.




Then I started attaching my flowers. All I did was cut each flower stem a bit below the leaf, leaving enough stem to push the flower into the styrofoam ball. I worked my way around the ball, alternating my flowers randomly until I covered the entire ball. I filled in any gaps with some moss and I also covered the foam in my vase with some moss as well.



Lastly, I tied on a pretty fall colored ribbon and, voila, a simple, inexpensive fall topiary that sits on my sewing machine just inside my front door. What a pretty, colorful welcome greeting!



The supplies for this one cost me under $10 (not counting what I already had on hand). I will definitely be making some more of these. It was easy and came together very quickly.

I also bought myself a beta fish this weekend and made a flower arrangement with the beta swimming in the bottom of the vase. I added some gingham ribbon to the vase to make it look a bit more country. I didn't take a picture but I will try to get one on soon.

I also started on some fall and halloween salt dough bowl fillers. I will share those with y'all on Wednesday. Hopefully I will have them finished by then!

I have to go back to work tomorrow. Bummer! I am thankful I have a job, but I REALLY enjoy these three day weekends!

Until next time. . .