Making fresh flowers last for weeks

I love having fresh flowers on the dinner table. It makes dinner just a little more special. Since I’m lacking an Oprah like income level, this doesn’t happen all the time. But when I spring for a bouquet at Costco, or my hubby brings me flowers (or in this case, my sweet sister), I want to make them last.

I do this by 1.) changing the water often and 2.) picking out the dead or dying flowers and filling in with random greenery and blooms from my yard.

I don’t have a cutting garden, but just a few rose bushes and lots of shrubs. You can do this too by just thinking creatively. Here are two arrangements I stretched:

To this arrangement I added those blue flowers and the green berries from a shrub. I also filled in with the last few roses of the season. There weren’t enough to make a bouquet of their own, but mixed in they look fine.

After about half of the original bouquet had faded, I removed the dying flowers and added berries and leaves from a tree to the fall flowers I had been given.

Using a little creativity and what is growing in my yard I can stretch my flower arrangements for weeks…works for me!

For more “works for me Wednesday” tips, check out Shannon’s Blog- Rocks in my Dryer.