A Gift That Keeps on Giving

My brother and sister in law brought me a fun gift for my birthday back in February.  It's an old galvanized oil can filled with "winter dried" flowers, brances, and adorned with hearts and packages of seeds.  Well I dismantled it yesterday in order to "spring" it up a bit. Unfortunately, I didn't take a picture of it first. :(

Anyway, some of the dried flowers she put it there were little brown buttons that used to be Black Eyed Susans.  Yesterday, I went to look in my garden to see if mine had "wintered" the same as hers.

Yes, they had!  Isn't this a neat bunch of dried little buds?

Well, then I noticed that the Purple Cone flowers were awesome too!  Problem was that I was in the mood for spring and these are much more fall and winter-ish.

So, I spray painted some.  Just to see....and I liked it.  The white ones are gorgeous, but very frosty and wintery looking.  

But, the white blend well with the mint green and butter yellow of the others.  I just used spray paint I had left over from other projects, so I count this project as free. 

I decided for such perfectly cheap flowers, only tin cans would do to house them.  I have posted about my love of tins cans before here and here.

Snippets of vintage fabric cut from rag balls really add a perfect touch!!

I've saved some of the dried flowers to paint next winter for a big arrangement of white dried flowers.

I thought I better post this before you, who are gardeners, get your flower beds cleaned out and perhaps miss these beauties.  If you don't have some, maybe a neighbor or friend does who will let you grab them. 

So my gift from my brother and sister in law not only brought me happiness that day, but it made me see my dead winter dried flowers in a new way and led to a very fun project!!

And, it should lead to more flowers with the seeds they gave me.

There's more the gift led to also, but this is enough for one post. :)

Have a great day!