DYI Spanish Moss Topiary

I have wanted some nice topiaries for my dining room for awhile and when I looked at the price tag on most pre-made ones I decided I could make some for a much more reasonable price. I bought all of my materials from Michael's except for the bamboo sticks and the thinner branches, which came from my yard. 

Here are my finished topiaries.

Here is a step by step tutorial...

Supplies Needed:

Terracotta pot

paint if you want to paint your pot as I did

Styrofoam square

Styrofoam ball

Spanish moss

hot glue gun and glue sticks

dowel rod or straight branch from your yard

thin "bendable" branches from your yard

sheet moss

Paint terracotta pots and let dry.

Cut Styrofoam square to fit tightly into your terracotta pot.

Place Styrofoam square into pot. You want it to fit firmly so cut it so that it barely fits into the pot, then push it down until it is a little below the rim of the pot.

Cover your Styrofoam ball with Spanish moss. Dealing with the moss made quite a mess, but it was easy to clean up afterward. Just cover a small portion at a time with hot glue, then press a bunch of moss onto the glue and hold. Leave a tiny portion uncovered at the bottom so you can insert your branch. Once you are finished gluing you can use scissors to cut off any long strands that stick out too far. Glue the moss together tightly so you cannot see the green Styrofoam underneath.

Before you insert your dowel rod or branch into your pot drill a pilot hole (see picture below). This will help the branch to go down straight.

Also, drill a pilot hole into the ball so the branch will go in a bit easier and stay straight. 

Once you have the holes correct take your branches back out and put hot glue onto the branch at the bottom (around the bottom couple of inches) and stuck it into your Styrofoam square. I also put a thick blob of glue around the edges of the branch and onto the Styrofoam...this way the branch didn't have any wiggle room. Make sure that you are holding your branch completely straight and that it is at the height you want so that once that thick glue around the bottom sets it is holding your branch exactly the way you want it to stand. Also put glue onto the top of your branch before you put the moss ball onto it. This way it will be held tightly together from the top and the bottom.

I took some very thin wispy branches and cut them to the right length. Then I hot glued it at the top (had to hold firmly against the thicker branch until the glue set. Then I wound it around the branch until the bottom. Then I hot glued it to the thick branch at the bottom. If you don't want to use hot glue for this step you could also use some thin floral wire to attach the thin branches.

Once the thin branches were set, I wanted to cover up the place where I glued them into place. So, on the ball I just added a little more moss around the base of the ball and glued it around to cover all the glue I had used. I did the same at the bottom with some sheet moss. This moss worked great in the pot to cover the Styrofoam square. You would never guess that under that moss was just Styrofoam!

Finished topiary!

I'm very happy with the way they turned out.

I would say the total cost for supplies was about $15 per topiary.

not bad compared to other retail prices!

Window Treatment

The window in our eat-in kitchen area finally has a window treatment. When we moved into the house back in the Summer I had a vision for this window, but it has taken until now to have it all come together. I knew I wanted shelving of some sort above the window for decorative purposes. I had these trays displayed above my kitchen cabinets at our last apartment and although there is some room above my cabinets in this kitchen, the space isn't as tall so my pretty trays wouldn't fit.

For Christmas my in-laws gave me a set of brackets (from IKEA) and said they had a piece of leftover wood I could use for my shelf. It is a good, thick piece of wood, but it was a bit too long for what I wanted and it was stained brown, which I wasn't sure about either. After putting up the brackets and looking at it in my kitchen I decided on the right length and color I wanted.

Kane cut the wood to length and spray painted it black for me. My mother-in-law went shopping with me for fabric during her last visit and she kindly took home what we bought to sew my valance for me after we made a plan for how it would hang underneath the shelf (without a curtain rod). Once her sewing was done she mailed it to me and I bought the rest of the supplies needed to finish the project.

I got some small hooks from Lowe's and we screwed them directly into the bottom of the shelf. I also sewed some small plastic rings to the back side of the valance to "hang" it from the hooks---and I'm very happy with the way it turned out!

My window treatment--what do you think?!

Sorry the lighting isn't better. It's hard to take a picture of something when there's a light fixture right in the way!

Another angle

Next project: an extra long bed skirt for the bed in our guest room. Just put it up on elevators to make more room for storage and now it's too tall for a standard sized bed skirt.

Tuie-I'll probably be calling on you for more help with this task too!
At least for some sewing related brainstorming.

Fun Slide Show

My dear friend, Bobbi Jo, put together this slide show of pictures of Mara Kate. These are pictures she took of her awhile back which I still haven't gotten around to ordering, but thought it would be fun to post the slide show on here for everyone's enjoyment.

If you are interested in a booking a portrait session with Bobbi Jo, you will definitely get your money's worth. Click here to get to her website.

Getaway

After Kane finished everything up at Georgia Tech and we made the move up to Rome, we hightailed it out of town for 3 nights to spend some quality time together, before things get busy again with Kane's new job at Shorter College. This trip was to celebrate the END of graduate school (forever!), our 5th anniversary, which was the end of July and my birthday, which took place while we were on our little getaway.

We decided to head up to Chattanooga since it's not too far from Rome, and stay at a Bed & Breakfast in Lookout Valley. We had a great time doing a bit of sight seeing as well as getting in some good relaxation.

We are very thankful to Kane's mom who came to Rome to stay with Mara Kate. She also kept herself busy by checking things off my to-do list, so I had less to do when I got home. Love it! Thanks Tuie!


Some pictures of our time...

Sitting at breakfast on the deck at the B&B. We had a private meal,
outside each morning and it was wonderful!

At Ruby Falls
We went to Ruby Falls the morning of my birthday. We had always seen signs advertising it from the interstate whenever we'd drive through Chattanooga, so we decided to check it out. It was pretty interesting.

Some formations inside the cave, leading to the falls.

Look closely, this formation is supposed to look like the
back side of a donkey. And, it really did!

I thought these looks neat. I think they said these resemble drying tobacco leaves.

And, finally the Falls, after a half mile "hike" into the side of Lookout Mountain.
Very pretty and the temperature 1100 feet underground was very, very pleasant.

Heading over the walking bridge to the carousel in Coolidge Park.

Yes, we rode the carousel. I think we were the only adults who rode
who didn't have children with them.

(pic is a little grainy, but still ok)

After supper on my birthday. We went to a restaurant called Big River Grill and it was excellent. We really enjoyed the food there!! Very tasty!

These pictures were taken on the grounds at the B&B. The view was so pretty.

New Pictures

Our friend Bobbi Jo came for a visit the other day and ended up snapping some cute pictures of Mara Kate. Click here to view them! (you can order prints too from this site).

Forever Friend

"A friend is always a friend."
Prov. 17:17

A couple weeks ago we had a visit from two very special girls! My friend Victoria and her little girl, Annalise (age 20 months).

Victoria is one of my closest friends and oldest---I met her when my family moved to Bristol, Virginia when I was 14. We were fast friends and I'm so thankful that our friendship has endured and lasted since we were barely teenagers to now that we are both married and live our daily lives as wives and mothers.

I remember the days when the only thing we had to think about was our next social outing or what to wear to church on Wednesday evenings which back then was the "highlight" of our weeks---ha. :)

Victoria and I were both in each others weddings and our friendship has had to reach far over many miles now that I live in Atlanta and she lives in Michigan. Now that my parents no longer live in Bristol I haven't been able to see her in quite awhile. We used to try to connect over holidays and such when we were both in town visiting family, but that hasn't happened in almost 2 years.

So, when Victoria called me a few months ago and told me she was wanting to come visit, I gladly welcomed that news! I excitedly waited for the time of her scheduled visit and we had so much fun while she was here. It is amazing when friendships go back that far, yet you still have much in common (most importantly serving Jesus Christ). The time and the miles fell quickly away and I felt like we were right back to when we lived in the same town and saw each other almost daily.

I've posted quite a few of pictures as I wanted to share about all we did through pictures....enjoy. :)

Victoria arrived at the Atlanta airport on Thursday morning. We mostly chilled that day while she got settled into Mara Kate's room. Friday we were able to go to a playgroup with some of my friends here in Atlanta so Victoria could meet the sweet girls I love here. After the playgroup we were able to meet one of her friends who lives outside of Atlanta for lunch. That evening we went to Michael's together to get supplies to start a little craft project we wanted to do together while she was here.

The finished craft project---door signs for her kid's rooms

On Saturday we decided to drive to meet Heidi and Olivia for lunch and a visit. Because I grew up with Victoria that also means Heidi did too. Since she is only 2.5 hours from me, we figured it would be an easy drive to meet her half-way so Victoria and Heidi could see one another and see their little girls who are about 5 weeks apart in age. Heidi actually had a wedding to go to that Saturday in Rome, GA and since Rome, GA was still only about an hour away we decided to meet there so she could see us and still attend the wedding that evening. The ironic thing is that Kane recently interviewed for a job in Rome, Ga (Shorter College) so there is a good possibility we could end up living in Rome by the end of the Summer. So, while we were there is was fun to drive around town and show Heidi and Victoria the place that could become home for us soon. We also drove up to the Shorter College campus to show them where Kane could have his first job after graduate school.

We met for lunch at this cute little cafe in downtown Rome.

The girls entertaining themselves at lunch---
Annalise and Olivia both had fun sucking on lemons. :)

Heidi and Victoria

Vic and Annalise---Annalise looks like a mini version of her mama!

Another baby girl who greatly resembles her mama! Olivia and Heidi

The little girls---Olivia, Mara Kate and Annalise.
There are two other children in our mix, but the boys weren't present. Jonathan (4) stayed home with his daddy in Michigan and Grant (3) stayed with his daddy for the day to go to a birthday party in Alabama. We missed them both, but it was fun to have an all-girls day!

All the girls!

Me and my beautiful sister! Love you Heidi!

Vic and me!

After lunch we headed over to a great playground in Rome to let the girls run off some energy.

Lots of fun was had by all. It was a special day!

That evening Victoria and I headed over to Atlantic Station so she could see one of Atlanta's neat shopping opportunities. The only thing we ended up shopping for was some ice cream from Cold Stone Creamery, but it was so yummy. Since the little girls were at home in bed with Kane supervising we just sat and chatted for quite awhile. It was a very good ending to a rather long day.

Once quick self-portait--(not great of me), but we were having a great time together.

Annalise and Mara Kate eating supper together.

After church on Sunday morning

Mara Kate wanted to take a picture so I had her take it of Annalise and me....thus the reason for the large upward angle of the picture. :)

On the last day of Victoria's visit we had the opportunity to go to a Day Spa for some complimentary relaxation treatments. Two weeks before Victoria came she went on a cruise with her hubby and while in the Southern Caribbean she and her husband met a lady from Atlanta (Joy) who is a massage therapist and owns a day spa. They connected and exchanged information and she told Victoria to get in touch with her when she was here visiting me...so she called her and this sweet, sweet lady invited us to come to a 2 hour private session at her spa for some complimentary relaxation. She even said to just bring our girls! It was an amazing morning and so much fun. We relaxed and visited and even went out to lunch afterward with Joy. Joy and I also made the connection of some mutual friends from my church so we ended up exchanging information too. I was reminded of God's goodness and what a small world we live in!

Heated massage bed. I did a 30 minute treatment in this.

Mara Kate snapped this of me while I was in the middle of my treatment.

Annalise and Mara Kate hanging out in the waiting room. They ran back and forth from the waiting room back to the therapy rooms. I brought stickers, paper, crayons, coloring books and books which they played with a little. But I think they also enjoyed just running around and checking in on Vic and I while we were getting our treatments.

Annalise playing with Victoria's toes during her massage. ha!:)

All relaxed after an hour massage.

Annalise getting a foot treatment. :)

Joy was sweet enough to get the girls involved in the pampering as well!

Mara Kate and I soaking our feet.
This was also after I had a 30 minute detoxification foot bath (very interesting).

Victoria using the "Chi Machine". It jerkes your ankles quickly left and right for 5+ minutes straight. I used it too and when the machine finished it shot tingles quickly up my entire body and out of my head. Very weird, but relaxing sensation.

All done!! So much fun!

Victoria, your visit was so wonderful and uplifted me greatly. I thoroughly enjoyed our time together and so not want to let so much time go between visits next time. Thank you for being a "forever friend".