How to: Boxwood Topiary

Ok since several of you asked I thought I would go ahead and post a little tutorial on how you can make your own boxwood topiary.

You could:

a. Keep your eyes peeled at your local thrift store for a topiary in need of a makeover or
b. run like the wind to your local craft store to pick up some supplies and start from scratch

Supplies you will need:

• Floral foam ball {You could also use a styrofoam ball but they are more $$ and you would need to paint it green}

• a stick from your yard

• faux boxwood plant {I bought two plants at Hobby Lobby and used about one and a half}  

• cute pot or planter

• floral foam for inside your container {I picked mine up at the Dollar Tree!}

• moss {you could use reindeer moss, spanish moss, etc.}

• hot glue gun

Ok, let's get started!!  Put some floral foam down into the bottom of your container.  I had my foam stop just shy of the rim of my pot.

Now take your stick {cut to desired length} and push it into the center of your foam.  Take your stick back out of the hole you just made and put a few drops of hot glue down into your hole.  Quickly put your stick back into the hole in your foam and hold in place until the glue is set.  For good measure you can also put a little bit of hot glue around the stick at the top of the foam to make sure that the stick is really secure.

Take your foam ball and push it down onto the top of your stick.  You will be left with a foam ball lollipop!

Take your boxwood plant and cut off little pieces about this size {see picture below}.  You need a little bit off stem so you can push it down into the floral foam enough for it to stay.  You could cut longer pieces depending how far out of the foam you want your stem to stick out/up.

Now start poking your little stems one by one into your foam ball. Warning: this part does take a while to do!

Pack those little stems in as tightly as you can so that when you are finished you won't be able to see the ball underneath.

And pretty soon you will have something that is starting to resemble a topiary.  YAY!!

Now take your moss out of the bag and pull it apart into little chunks.  Put some hot glue on the top of the floral foam you have in your container and very carefully press your moss down onto the glue.

I used the tip of a knife to very gently press the moss where I wanted it to go.  Keep gluing down little pieces of moss until you can't see any floral foam anymore.  I used the least amount of moss that I could manage because I didn't want it to stick up out of the pot that much.  {Sorry I didn't take any pictures of this part because I figured it would be pretty self explanatory.}

You can tie a little ribbon onto your stick or just leave it as is.  And there you have it.  Your very own boxwood topiary!!  Ok, actually that one is mine.

I spent about $11 on my thrift store topiary makeover which isn't too bad considering my ballard designs inspiration topiary retails for $50-$65.

{p.s. If anyone has any questions you can email me at talesandtrials@gmail.com or leave your question in the comment section.}