Met. Monday - A little Fall

Thanks so much to Susan @ Between Naps On The Porch for hosting this fun event. I always look forward to seeing what everyone has been doing. Be sure to check out her blog to see what she's been up to and to see a list of all the participants.

I love to look through some of the higher end furniture stores for decorating ideas. Their accessories are usually stunning and very expensive. I saw a centerpiece at Ladlow's that used bronze, gold and cream pumpkins in a floral arrangement that I thought would be beautiful in my home and at $450 I thought I could create it for less. Obviously they price these pieces so they won't sell, but I liked the idea of the pumpkins in a floral arrangement.

This is what I came up with and a really close copy.

I gathered some of the pumpkins and gourds that I found at the Dollar Tree and a few springs of greenery.

I had some Ant. Bronze, Gold, Ant. White and Clear spray paint.

I used a skewer to stick in the bottom of one of the pumpkins to use to hold it while I spray painted it.

I sprayed them an assortment of the Ant. White, Bronze, Gold and then used Clear over them to finish off. I just put the skewers in a clay pot to hold them up to dry. When they are painted and then sprayed with the clear they look like they are ceramic and not plastic at all. The camera had a hard time capturing that.

Next I got out the bin of dried and silk flowers that I have and found a few things that I thought looked like the arrangement that I was trying to copy. I also added a few feathers.

This pumpkin had the speckles on it, so I just sprayed it with 3 coats of clear to give it that ceramic look. You can also see some of the small gourds that I painted white, bronze and gold.

I sprayed this one bronze and then gave it a light dusting of the gold.

Not an exact copy, but really close. I love it and it really does go with my home decorations a lot better than all the oranges and it still looks like fall.

I must have taken 30 pictures and just couldn't get the light right. In real life the gourds and pumpkins really do look like they are ceramic and have such a fabulous shine to them that it really sets the arrangement off beautifully.

This is another arrangement that I copied from a visit to Ethan Allen a few years ago. When you're out shopping, be sure to pay attention to all the accessories, they spend a fortune to dress things up for their displays, and you can usually copy them for pennies.