{wedding flashback} flower pomander

I have a good friend and my brother getting married this summer, so I have weddings on the brain a bit, which hasn’t been the case for the last 6 years or so.   This is sometimes how I feel about my wedding:Haha.  My mom is actually pretty thankful Pinterest wasn’t around during my wedding planning because I already had quite a few projects that I came up with on my own.  Since I didn’t have a blog back then (I did have a wedding website that some of you will remember), I thought I’d do a few posts over the next couple months titled “wedding flashback” and share a few of the craft projects that made my wedding mine.  The first one I’ll share is my flower girl’s pomander.  Even though I used real flowers everywhere else in my wedding, when my florist quoted me about $75 for a real pomander, I decided to make her one she could keep.  And this was a very simple project.  So here are the supplies you need to gather:

• 2-3 bunches of the flowers you want to use (I normally am very opposed to carnations in any form, but when they’re in mass like this, they’re not too bad) :)
• 5” Styrofoam ball (not pictured) 
• craft paint in the color of your flowers
• cheap craft paint brush
• hot glue gun
• coordinating ribbon
• straight pins (optional)

Step 1
Paint the Styrofoam ball with the paint.  While this seems unnecessary since you are covering the ball with flowers, trust me and do it.  It will mean that if there are any areas not covered by flowers, you won’t be able to tell.  I painted 2 coats and let it dry overnight before adding the flowers.  I used a little dish to keep it from rolling all over. Step 2
Heat up your glue gun.  Decide where you want your ribbon handle and how long you want it.  I think mine was about 6-8” total.  I pinned it in place and also secured it with hot glue just to be sure it stayed!Step 3
Take the flowers off the stems and remove any leaves.  Poke one flower down into the Styrofoam ball.   Step 5
Remove the flower and fill the little hole with hot glue.  Put the flower back into the hole and let it set for a minute to cool.  Whew, sorry for the blurry picture.
Step 5
Repeat the process over and over until your entire ball is covered with flowers.  I put them pretty close together as I wanted a dense looking pomander.  But it will also depend on the size of the flowers you choose.  And ta-da a cute pomander.Here’s a few pictures of it in action on the big day: