Craft night at Courtney's!

My friend Courtney is having her wedding DIY style.  She is making it all... her invitations, her centerpieces and her wedding favors. She had a few impromptu craft nights that I couldn't make it to but I did still get to participate in a little crafting. : ) It wasn't really a "craft night"; pretty much I needed to charge my phone and instead of sitting around doing nothing for an hour, I decided that we should craft.

Our task was the table centerpieces. They are super easy and cheap to make. Courtney estimated they're about $6/centerpiece and we made 20 in a little over an hour. Courtney said she saw some centerpieces with marbles online and knew that's what she wanted. (The rest of the design were her ideas.) But she didn't want to buy vases. So inspiration struck and she used old juice containers. This girl recycles -- no wonder we're friends!

Wedding centerpiece tutorial:
              Materials needed - juice container, ribbon, box cutter, marbles, hot glue, scissors and flowers

This isn't quite all the materials but I LOVE this hot glue gun. It works so well!! I want it!!

1. Cut the top half off the juice bottle, remove the label and clean. The bottom half now should look like a vase.

2. Add marbles. Courtney used about half a bag of decorative marbles per vase. After we finished our project, we decided it might be a good idea to put sand at the bottom of the vase and then add the marbles so it looks a little more filled.

3. While the hot glue gun is heating up, measure and cut the ribbon. Stick the end of the ribbon to the sticky part of the bottle where the label was. Then you won't have to hold it in place as much when you measure. 

4. Put a dab of hot glue in the center of the bottle and glue the flower stem into the bottle.  Hold in place until the glue is dried.

 Courtney bought bouquets of silk flowers and cut them into individual stems. Its a little extra work but it was more cost-efficient than buying individual stems.

5. Glue the ribbon around the bottle.

They look really nice when they're done and you get the satisfaction of knowing that you made them. This doesn't have to be a two person craft but it goes faster if it is. Courtney did the ribbon measuring and held the flowers in place while they dried. And I got to do all of the gluing (mostly because I was in love with her hot glue gun).  

I want to thank Courtney for letting me be a part of her wedding and helping me with this tutorial.