Hi Joli: Inexpensive, fun and different, always a challenge. About two years ago we did a very fun segment on one of the craft shows using just handmade paper bags and organic materials. This is personally one of my more favorite types of things to do since there is virtually no limit on the materials you can use, and if you are a scavenger like me, you may already have a stash of goodies waiting to be used. Also, since this is for a craft party, everyone could bring their own favorite weeds, flowers, shells, pods, and assorted gatherings.

Ok, so is this how we did it. We started with a selection of various handmade paper bags. All of the ones that we used were relatively small (5” x 5”, 3” x 4”, etc.,) but you could, of course, use any size that you wanted, you would just have to work with larger quantities of material. You could also work with regular brown kraft paper bags, or even printed bags. We chose to work with the handmade paper ones because they carried out the organic theme that we wanted to explore.

After settling on the bags you want to use, you are going to need blocks of floral foam. You can work with either the dry or wet (usually known as “Sahara” or “Oasis”). You can sometimes buy small quantities of these from your local florist, but for a party you would probably want to go to a large craft store to purchase the blocks. They come in a “brick” shape and can be very easily cut to any size or shape with even a kitchen table knife.

Measure the dimensions of your bag. Be sure to include the gusset depth when doingthis. Now, using a knife, cut off a piece of your floral foam as close to your size (width and depth) as possible. The piece you cut will probably not be as tall as the depth of your bag but that does not matter, you just want it to fit snugly into the bottom, with as little slack as possible. You can achieve this fairly easily by making your first piece a bit larger than you think you need, then slowly slicing bits off until you have a piece that tucks in tightly. You want to fill the bag up to about ½” from the top with similar blocks of floral foam, so cut another piece this same size, trim the top off if it is now too tall, then hot glue this piece to the top of your first piece. Obviously, if you are using a larger bag you will need to continue adding trimmed blocks of floral foam until you have the bag open and taut. On really large bags you will also need to do this same thing to fill in the sides.

Now for the fun part. Spread all your goodies out and decide what look you want to go for. Beach and seashore? Maybe a woodsy look, or perhaps something soft and romantic? With this technique you can even create great looking pieces for a country kitchen look. You will probably find, as I did, that as you get started on doing one or two of these, other ideas will start coming to you and you will just HAVE to try out that other inspiration. Incidentally, this is a very popular look in European floral shops.

Play with your materials until you get a basic idea of what and where you are going with your project, then using a hot glue gun, start putting your pieces into the foam. Things with long stemss can have bit of hot glue applied, then inserted deeply into the floral block. Other things, like shells, small pieces of driftwood, stones, coffee beans, etc. will need a squeeze of hot glue on them and then you can nestle them into the foam and/or onto each other. And remember, you don’t need to stop with the top of the bag. Depending on your design concept you can carry the materials over the edges, or even make the sides part of the actual arrangement.