EASY-PEASY CENTERPIECE FOR CHAIRTY EVENT

Last Saturday was Alzheimer's Idaho (local grassroots organization) annual golf tournament. I volunteered to make centerpieces for the tables.  The goal was to make a nice centerpiece while at the same time keeping cost down so that the centerpieces could be sold at the end and make a little money for AI in the process.

 Deciding on the design was the first order of the day.  I love ivy and the elegant way that it drapes but small ivy plants from the florist were out of the question for (24) centerpieces.  So - I went to my local garden store and bought ivy plants - the kind for ground cover, they had three different varieties so I bought some of each.  I had almost two weeks to the day to make these so we just put them on the patio and watered them and put them out in sun for a little bit of each day and they flourished and in two weeks we had quite a bit of growth.  I found some twig baskets that were plastic lined at a local import store, so no need for a saucer. Now all I needed was ribbon, silk flowers, florist pins and bags of moss.

You can see in this photo (before any ribbon placed) that the moss just finishes off the centerpiece and hides the ivy pot.

Inexpensive florist pins (see lower right in photo) are a very good way to hold down ribbon or some of the plant, great to use to help balance the design. Besides the plants and the twig basket all you need for the centerpieces is a bow for each one and various flowers from the $ store that you cut off of the stems, and some sticks.  Once the bows are made, the flowers cut off the stems it is just a matter of sitting down and putting them all together.  I think it took me maybe six hours or so to do the 24 centerpieces.

I used two types of ribbon and lots of different flowers so each one was different.

A nice little basket to take home.

The last thing that I did was to make a pick to go inside the pot to let the attendees know that the centerpieces were available to take home. By keeping the cost down I was able to make 24 centerpieces for $137.55 or $5.73 each meaning that after deducting for the cost the charity would net $342.55 for the cause.  Truth in advertising I donated the ribbon, wire, florist pins, paper and picks. Both the garden store (thank you Zamzow's) and the import store (thank you Tai Pan Trading) gave me a discount when I told them I was making centerpieces for a charity golf tournament.

Resource

Plants, Zamzow's, Eagle, Idaho
Twig Baskets, Tai Pan Trading, Boise, Idaho
Black plaid ribbon, Costco
Red plaid ribbon, fine design store
Moss & flowers, Dollar Tree
Florist pins, Walmart
Wooden skewers for pick, grocery store
Ivy/Heart pick design, Corel Draw
Font for pick, Comic Sans, MS

Thank you for stopping by.