Creating a Silk Flower Display in an Antique Wicker Planter

Silk Flowers are a wonderful alternative to live plants, especially when you are decorating a porch.  They do not drop leaves or petals or need to be watered.  I pulled out of a friend's basement an antique wicker planter that needed paint and a bit of glue.  Luckily the zinc insert was there.

 After sprucing up the planter, I turned to my long time friend, Rick Caran, a silk floral designer.

 He is currently known internationally as an expert in animal training, and tours with his original dog, Jilli, and new puppies, doing paid and benefit shows.

 This photo shows the zinc liner, which I rubbed with steel wool, and lightly spray painted.  The wicker basket planter was wire brushed gently and loose ends were glued with waterproof glue, then spray painted three times.

Rick measures the flower foam to fit the opening of the planter.

Here Rick is scoring the flower foam in order to

 snap it in half with his knee.

 The original piece was too low in the planter, so he contributed another piece of foam to raise up the base.

Just the right height.

 Next he used Sure Stick, which came off this spool like a sring of chewing gum.

 He pushed a bit into the edges to anchor the foam to the zinc liner.

 When the foam was secure, Rick placed real Spanish Moss, which he gathered on one of his trips south, over the foam.

 He tucked it in to cover the foam.

 After sharpening the end of each flower stem with a pocket knife,  Rick used  his special machine to clamp on a metal tip.

 These tips hold each flower stem in the foam, and do not allow the flowers to loosen later on.

 He wrapped each tip with green floral tape.

 I brought some silk ivy which he arranged in the planter.  We wanted the patterns on the wicker planter to show through the ivy.

 Each silk stem was pushed down into the foam and secured.  He draped the ivy on both sides so that the planter could be viewed from either direction.

 I decided to use silk Hydrangeas, which would have a traditional "antique porch look."  We kept the color pallet to just whites and light blues with smaller light green  Hydrangeas to imitate nature.

At first Rick thought the flowers were too large, but they needed to be a good size to be seen by passing boats from the  water side.  He arranged the blooms at different heights in an asymmetrical naturalistic way.

 

 The planter finished in his garden, but how would it look on the porch?

 The colors were perfect with the awning and old wicker chairs.

 On the porch.

 My friend ordered silk hanging baskets full of Geraniums.

The look was complete, no falling leaves or petals, and after covering them and storing them elsewhere for the winter, good for future years.  Thanks Rick!

Wedding Reception Baskets for Ladies & Gents Bathrooms

 

 A great job for the mother of the Groom is the creation of Guest Bathroom Baskets for the Reception hall.

 My future daughter-in-law entrusted this task to me.  So that is what this pile of items will be turned into.

 After looking up suggestions for the contents of such baskets on the Internet, I headed for the local dollar store.

I decided not to use wicker baskets, but rather colorful plastic baskets, blue for the gents, green for the ladies. 

 At first I thought that I would line the baskets with pieces of a colorful plastic table cloth.  But then I opted for weaving white tulle through the openings.

 I gathered a second piece of tulle for a bow.

The colorful plastic cloth was cut up into smaller pieces to fit just the bottom of the baskets.

 I kept with the color theme and loaded the gents basket with blue wrapped items.  (List to follow.)

 The dollar store had cute smaller pails for the hand soap, small cups,  mouth wash, and room fresheners.

 The ladies baskets contained green wrapped items with a few pinks and purples too.

 I found very nice paper folded and monogrammed hand towels.

 I added tulle bows to the pails.

My future daughter-in-law supplied me with two picture frames with easel backs which were perfect for  a poetic message of welcome for the guests.  I combined two poems that I  found on-line and a  free graphic.

 I made tags which identified which wedding and which bathroom, ladies or gents, the baskets were intended for. The baskets are to be dropped off a day or so before the wedding, so no mistakes.  This made it clear to the reception hall staff where the baskets were to be placed.

 I added the towels to the pails.

At the dollar store, I found packages of two large cellophane gift wrapping bags.

 These made it easy to wrap up the baskets, so that the contents would not fall out during their trip from my house to the reception hall.  The items could be better arranged once they arrived at the reception hall restrooms.

Job done!  It occurred to me that this could be a nice little on-line business for someone who likes to create gift baskets.  An item list could be supplied, customized by a check off, and it easily shipped to very busy brides maids, or like me, mothers of the groom.

Possible items:

rolls of breath mints, mouth wash and small cups, band-aids, safety pins, Aspirin, or Advil, pocket tissues, small bottles of hand sanitizer, floss, deodorant, eye glass or contact lens cleaners, emery boards, cough drops, Chapstick,  notepads and pens, hand lotion, Q-tips, combs, sewing kits, gum or hard candy, matches, bobby pins and elastic hair bands, tampons, panty liners, samples of perfume, cotton balls, take away tooth brushes, and tooth paste, Tic-tacs.