Some of the best things in the Pottery Barn catalog are not what they are selling, but what they are not. You may remember last year that my love (and I mean LOVE) of Peonies drew me to this PB photo.
Do you see that arrangement far back in the right corner? Let me zoom in.
If you look closely, you can see that the Pottery Barn stagers have added these gorgeous flowers to a big vase of seashells. I was so in love with this arrangement, that I made my own mini-version last summer.
Here we are almost a year later, and I am still obsessed with that arrangement. I’ve been patiently waiting for fresh cut peonies to come available in local stores this Spring. Sadly, they do not grow well in my area, so I am unable to grow my own.
Imagine my surprise when I walked into Whole Foods last weekend and found tons of gorgeous Peonies waiting on me to take them home! They were about $10 for a bunch of 5 (gasp!), but I’ve been waiting so long that it was worth the cost to me.
When I got home, I set out to put together a new and improved version of my Pottery Barn inspired Peony and seashell arrangement. This most recent bunch of flowers had beautiful leaves and long stems, so I wanted to do something a little different. After playing around for a few minutes, this is what I came up with:
To create this arrangement, I filled the bottom of a tall, round vase with some shells. I then added water and my Peony stems. Next, I poured more shells into the vase so that they filled about 2/3 of the vase, making sure they covered the bottom of the stems. Last, I tied a little piece of jute ribbon around the vase for a finishing touch.
I love this arrangement even more than I loved last year’s arrangement. You can do this at home, right now. Even if you don’t have a ton of shells laying around like I do or access to Peonies, you can use rocks and any sort of long-stem flower that’s cheap. If you do use rocks that you collect yourself, just make sure you wash them really well so bits of dirt won’t be floating around in your flower water!
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I’m sure you have been anxiously awaiting the announcement of the winner of the Quality Custom Designs giveaway. Well, if you are lucky commenter #94, then congrats!
Congrats to Kimberly W! I’ll be sending you an email later today so that you and Mandy can be in touch about your custom roman shade!
If you didn’t win, no worries. I have a summer FULL of giveaways going on! Check back each Thursday for something new and exciting from one of my fabulous sponsors. You won’t want to miss it!
