Cheap Chic 2: a floral centerpiece for $10

I've caught the spring cleaning bug late. But now, that I have it, I've been looking around the house thinking about what I'd like to change (everything), and what I can afford to change (maybe a light bulb). All joking aside, I do intend to make some changes to the house--primarily a purge of extraneous crap (i.e. all of Thomas's things...mine are treasures, I swear), some painting, and some slipcovers. However, after making my intial to do lists (I love to make lists...actually doing the items on said list-not so much), I was so overwhelmed, I decided to smart small by cleaning the dining room, which is the smallest least cluttered room in the house and bringing in some fresh flowers for the table. Since money is tighter around here than last year's girdle, I did it with things I already owned and a couple of supermarket bouquets.
My inspiration: a white bowl (wal mart) filled with some green pears with touches of yellow ( faux, and a gift) that complement the orange stripes in the dining room and echo the pale green of the adjoining kitchen. Plus, light, bright green and white just feel like summer, especially with yellow accents. I wanted a large arrangement, but I don't have a large vase. So in order to create a large scale arrangement, I placed the bowl of pears and two white vases on a small pale green wooded tray to create one large centerpiece.

The materials. Variagated ginger leaves from the garden, yellow aster, lemons to jazz up the friut bowl (key tip for using faux friut and flowers...add some real items and it elevates the fake), and some white flower whose name I don't know but that I've used before and know lasts for a long time in a vase. I purposely kept the palette limited: green and yellow to echo the pears, white to echo the vase and to add freshness. Btw, ginger and split leaf philodendrums are great plants to put in the garden: they are super easy to grow, and their greenery looks great alone or in an arrangement, and they can last for several weeks if you change the water every now and then.

First, I like to start with the greenery, in this case ginger leaves, to give the basic structure to the arrangement. I also usually follow the pyramid rule in arrangeing flowers. In this case, it means the tallest point would be in the taller vase in the back.

Nest, I added the filler flowers, cutting the stems to fit the vase, and removing all greenery and blooms that would be under the level of the rim.

Next, I add the main white flower, again trimming the stem to fit the vase and stripping extra leaves and blooms. After that, I piled the real lemons over the faux pears.

Voila, an arrangement for $10, using what I already owned, that should last for a week to ten days. I will also use the lemons for cooking, lemonade, or a twist in my martini. In fact, my motto is, "If life gives you lemons, make a martini."

This angle shows how the bright green of the arrangement picks up the avacado kitchen.