‘Tis the season for romance and roses!  I always enjoy receiving roses from my sweetie from my local florist.  But, in between special occasions, I like to brighten my home with flowers.  Sometime that sends me to the florist, but sometimes I try to recycle and save money.  For the latter, here is an option.

My sister loves Nouvelle candles.  She had several of the gorgeous urns that no longer have a burnable candle inside.  The pottery urn is too nice to throw away.  She kindly shared a couple with me.

With one of my urns, I decided to make a flower arrangement.  I purchased a bundle of roses and WET floral foam at a big box store.  The roses were $15 and the 3-pack of foam was less than $3.  First, I soaked half of one of the floral foam bricks in water for a couple of hours.  I placed a bottle of dishwashing liquid on top of the foam brick in order to keep it submerged.

While it soaked, I cleaned out the candle urn, removing as much wax as I could, cleaning the soot off the rim, and removing the metal wick holders.  After the floral foam had absorbed plenty of liquid, I cut the foam to fit the container, cutting off the corners, and tapering the sides.  I then filled in smaller bits around any opening at the top.

With the roses, I cut off the stems, leaving about 3-4 inches below the flower head, and removed all leaves.  I placed one in the middle, and one of opposing sides.  I then added a rose on each of the two remaining open sides.  Then I filled in around them with the roses I had.  My bunch had 10 roses and some greenery.  I cut the greenery about 4 inches long, removing any leaves that would be caught by the foam.  This length allowed me to make two picks out of each greenery stem.  I put the nicer ones on top and the others around the side where they were more bunched.

For $16 and a little bit of time, I now have a lovely floral arrangement to grace my home or office.  This will work with any flowers and any little urn or container you have around the house.  So easy and so pretty!