A Lot of Bloom for your Buck!

A Big Bloom! This big flower was my "greeter" at the Georgia Preschool Conference. ( Sorry the picture isn't better but the lighting in the lecture rooms at the Galleria was not good!) My "greeter" got a lot of attention and several people wanted to know the particulars and cost. Lots of banquets, choir programs, and Mother's Day teas in our futures. This big flower was made from predominately recycled   (and therefore, free!!!! items) The black bucket was from The Dollar Tree- I painted the white polka dots on it. You could use a recycled family size tin can, paint can or any bucket you have.  I used an old yardstick for the stem but a scrap of lattice or a 1x2 would work as well. I painted it green and stuck it in the bucket with a small amount of Plaster of Paris type material- something my husband had in the basement but you can buy a big container of P of P (enough to do several projects) at Wal Mart for less than $5.00 ( you use about a dollars worth.)  I tied scraps of ribbon and fabric on it. The flower is created from recycled plastic lids and two frisbees (one cost 88 cents and the other came from the Dollar Tree.) The petals were rectangles of white fun foam that I dotted with a pencil eraser and black glossy acrylic paint. That's it- so $1.00 for the bucket, frisbee and P of P. The other frisbee was 88 cents and a piece of fun foam is 79 cents. I put Easter grass in the bucket to cover the P of P and I had that along with lids, paint and the yardstick. So the grand total for this really cute flower was less than $5.00 and if you had to buy everything including paint, ribbon and yardstick you would still be under $10.00. That's a lot of Bloom for your Buck!