Christmas Present Floral Arrangement by My Insanity

Kendra from My Insanity here today! I’m excited to be back at Honeybear Lane, especially to be able to help Heidi out so she can spend a little more time snuggling her new bundle of joy (and hopefully sleeping, too!)

Heidi and I share a love of flowers, so when she asked me to guest post, I immediately thought I might share another flower arrangement idea. We had previously swapped ideas for Valentines flower arrangements. And thought you might enjoys some ideas for beautifying your holiday season.

This could be used as a gift for your friends, or neighbors, or maybe you’ll want to keep it for your own Christmas dinner centerpiece. A few years back I made several small flower arrangements and took them around to our neighbors. That may seem like an expensive, gift, but can be done inexpensively if you get cheap containers (IKEA has vases for $2/ea and buy your flowers in bulk.

1. Here are the supplies for the present arrangement. I used a couple of bunches of mini-carnations. Mine were from Fresh & Easy. The two bunches I bought were $5/each and would have been enough for 2-3 arrangments. If you are making very many of these, you might look at some place like Costco for bigger bunches. I bought the gift box, vase, and package of gold plastic ornaments at the Dollar Store. In the supply picture I show floral wire, but ended up having a better result using bamboo skewers. In the botttom left, you’ll see a brick of floral oasis or WET floral foam. It is very important that you get WET foam and not DRY foam–unless you are working with artificial or dried flowers. You’ll also need a hot glue gun and glue.

2. If you do an arrangement in a clear vase, you’ll want to skip the foam. I like using foam in an arrangement like this, since the vase is covered by the gift box. It gives you a little more creative control, keeps things in place, and can help the flowers to last longer. If you are using floral foam. Cut a brick around the size of your vase and set it in a sink of clean water (you can add flower food to the water if you wish). Remember when working with floral foam, it’s best to let the foam soak up the water slowly. Do not submerge it completely in the water. When it sinks, it is full of water and ready to be used.

3. Fit the foam tightly into the vase. (Trim if necessary, or add an additional piece if it doesn’t fit snugly). Place the foam-filled vase inside the gift box.

What you do next, depends a little on how you want the arrangement to look. I didn’t want to use a ton of flowers, so I made sure I glued the gift box lid high on the corner of the box. I wanted it to look like Christmas is erupting from this gift box. If you wanted your arrangement to be a little more traditionally dome-shaped, glue the lid a bit lower down the side of the box. I just used hot-glue to attach it where I wanted and held it in place for a bit while it set.

Start adding your cut blooms one at a time. I concentrated the white carnations around the edges and the red and white ones a little higher. But you can place them however you like!

I had intended to add the Christmas balls to the arrangement using wire, but mine wasn’t working so well. A really thick gauge wire would work, but I found that sticking the end of half of a bamboo skewer into the ornament worked nicely. Then you can just stick the other end of the skewer into the foam to position it.

Just make sure the arrangement feels balanced as you add the flowers and balls.

In no time, you have a fun flower arrangement ready to grace your holiday table, or bring Christmas cheer to your friends.

If I had made a few of these, I would put the cost at about $7.50 each. You could cut costs, by using more greens and fewer blooms in your arrangement. Also buying your flowers in bulk will cut costs as well.

I’d love to have you come and check out more holiday insanity/ideas over on my blog!

Congrats and best wishes to Heidi and her family!