Here’s a fun way to add a pop of color and texture in any room! ANYone can do this.

If you’d like the look of a little floral touch in your home but making an “arrangement” is either intimidating or time-consuming or expensive or just plain not interesting to you … here’s something you can try.

I’m calling these 15-minute florals because it truly is that quick to put something like this together. Sometimes less. It certainly doesn’t require experience. You just need a vase, pot, jar, or some sort of container. And stems to your liking – silk flowers, dried  flowers, berries or whatever you want. Could be that you need 1 or 2 or a few or a dozen … depends on what look you’re going for (full and dense or sparse and simple) and how big the flowers are. The simplest approach is to get them all the same. Then  you’re not thinking about which flowers go well together and how many of each kind, etc.

Just cut each stem down, one at a time, and add them to the container. Not complicated.

Tip: The reason I recommend cutting the stems one at a time is so you can have varying heights. It looks more intentional than if you were to just stick a bunch of stems in a vase without trimming them at all.

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If you are creating a  piece that calls for a little more stability in your arrangement (you don’t want the flowers to shift around), here are some additional tips. For this arrangement where I knew the sunflowers would stand taller, I didn’t want them to flop over. So I used some styrofoam blocks (check in the floral dept of your local craft store).

Using a knife and a cutting board, trim the block(s) down to fit into your container. It could work out that you have one block or several smaller blocks. It doesn’t matter. And by the way, I don’t recommend using your good kitchen knives. It’s just the one I had handy this time.

Note: This styrofoam does get messy. Do your cutting in an area that is easy to clean up.

Shove the styrofoam in the bottom of your container so it’s snug.

Then start trimming your stems. Again — one at a time so you can stick them in the styrofoam one at a time.

These are the wire cutters I use. You can find a pair in the floral department of your local craft store or at a home improvement store … or you probably already have some. Ask your man if you don’t know where they are.  ; )

PS - I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Flowers (and floral supplies) frequently go on sale at JoAnn, Hobby Lobby, Michael’s and similar stores. Always buy them on sale. Otherwise they’re just pricy.

Did you know? If you haven’t noticed, most WalMart and Target stores also carry silk flowers. Check them out!

If anyone else has floral-related tips, advice, and great finds … do share!