How to Create Floral Arrangements for Every Room of the House for $20

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I was inspired to write this post thinking back on the time when, having graduated recently from college, I was living alone for the first time in a tiny apartment in Boston. I was still trying to figure things out as a freelancer and was broke. Despite this, every other week I would spend about $5 at the local grocery store on flowers and once a week I bought a bar of dark chocolate when I picked up my groceries at Trader Joes. These were my two big self-indulgences at a time when my weekly grocery budget was a strict $20, and I had to keep track of every penny. This may seem like a small thing, but to me, it made a huge difference. 

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On a recent shopping trip to Trader Joes, I decided to see just how far I could stretch $20 in their floral department, I had purchased loads of flowers from them to decorate the house for my daughter's first birthday and they rang in around $30-$35 dollars. I opted to embrace the filler this time around as it's only about $2.50 a bunch and to stick with a color palette to keep everything cohesive. I wanted the arrangement to feel springy so I chose green with accents in pink and white and yellow. Narrowing your selection down to just a few colors is a great way to make your arrangements feel intentional and to unite different elements. Since I was going to be working mostly with filler I also decided to focus on texture to keep things interesting. Here's what I purchased and how I created my arrangements. 

 

 Flowers pictured: White Tulips, Pink Carnations, Bells of Ireland, Yellow Estelle, White Larkspur

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 1. I laid out the flowers on a counter and removed the plastic then trimmed the stems about an inch at a slight angle.

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2. I selected an assortment of vases, I wanted to have some unity while creating a variety of arrangements so I decided to stick with glass vessels in a range of sizes and shapes.

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3. I started with the greenery, evenly dispersing it among my vessels depending on their size, smaller containers may only get one sprig while the large ones get 3-4. I also trimmed the stems to an appropriate height when necessary.

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4. Following the same method as above add in your flowers. Make sure to turn your arrangements and check them out from all angles then adjust as needed.

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5. Enjoy!