Travel – Mount Rushmore and Crazy Horse

Posted on by

Mount Rushmore 2004 1    Crazy Horse 3

Both Mount Rushmore and Crazy Horse are located less than 20 miles from each other in the Black Hills of South Dakota and both of these monuments have many similarities but also there are some distinct differences.  Both monuments honor our American history, Mount Rushmore is carved with the faces of four very recognizable U.S. presidents while the Crazy Horse monument honors a Native American Lakota chief who is largely unknown with no photographic evidence of what he looked like.  Both monuments were carved into the mountains of the Black Hills over a long period of time; Mount Rushmore was carved in fifteen years while the work on Crazy horse was started in 1948 and is still a work in progress and far from completion. Mount Rushmore was built using Federal funds and the Crazy Horse monument is being built with funds generated from tourism revenues and donations.

Both sculptors of these iconic monuments were born to immigrant parents, both carved the mountains in the Black Hills to honor our American history and both died before the projects were completed and the work was taken over their children.  Mount Rushmore’s sculptor, Gutzon Borglum, was the son of Danish immigrants, grew-up in a Mormon household and later became involved with the Ku Klux Klan.  The sculptor of Crazy Horse, Korczak Ziolkowski, was the son of Polish immigrants and he originally came to South Dakota to work with Borglum on Mount Rushmore but soon quit when there were disagreements between the two men and Ziolkowski left to serve in World War II.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAWhen we visited Mount Rushmore in 2004, there was a book signing event for one of the last surviving workers, Don “Nick” Clifford, on the day we were there.  We had the opportunity to meet him and have an interesting conversation about his experiences back in the late 1930s carving Mount Rushmore.  Then the next day, when we arrived at the Crazy Horse Monument they were still actively blasting the mountain!  It was very exciting and we were able to take a short bus ride up to the base of the mountain.  Our personal opinion is that Mount Rushmore, while being extremely patriotic, had an atmosphere that was very commercial while the Crazy Horse monument seemed to have a purpose of using their revenue to provide scholarships to the Native Americans.  Both are very iconic monuments carved into the Black Hills that teach important cultural as well as historical lessons of our country and are definitely worth a visit to South Dakota.

Mount Rushmore 2004 2   OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Mount Rushmore

Mount Rushmore National Memorial, located in the Black Hills of South Dakota, is carved from a mountain known by the Lakota Native Americans as the Six Grandfathers.  This area of the Black Hills of South Dakota was perpetually granted to the Lakota Native Americans with an 1868 treaty guaranteed by the U.S. government but when gold was found in the area in 1874 the land was seized and the Lakota were forced to relocate elsewhere. In 1923, the idea for the Mount Rushmore project was originally conceived by a local historian as a way to increase tourism to the area.  After securing federal funding, construction on the memorial began in 1927, and the presidents’ faces were completed between 1934 and 1939.  Gutzon Borglum, a prominent sculptor, led a team of 400 workers between 1927 and 1941 who carved the granite mountain using dynamite and hand tools. The work was extremely difficult and dangerous, the wages were low and employment was uncertain but astonishingly there were no worker fatalities.

The Mount Rushmore National Memorial covers over 1,278 acres and is 5,725 feet above sea level.  The 60 foot high carvings of the faces of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt represents the first 150 years of American history.  In 1933, while the memorial was still under construction, the U.S. National Park Service took control of the memorial.  Upon Gutzon Borglum’s death in March 1941, his son Lincoln Borglum took over the construction team. Although the initial concept for Mount Rushmore was to depict each of the four presidents from their head to waist, with the U.S. involvement in World War II and lacking the funds to complete the project the construction was forced to end in late October 1941 with only the heads being carved.  In 1966, Mount Rushmore was listed on the National Register of Historic Places. In 1991, President George Bush officially dedicated Mount Rushmore and currently the monument attracts nearly three million visitors annually.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Mount Rushmore trivia and interesting facts

  • The Lakota, called the mountain the Six Grandfathers, but officially in 1885 it became known as Mount Rushmore and was named after New York attorney Charles Rushmore who came to this area of South Dakota to check on the legal titles of properties located in the Black Hills.
  • About 90% of the mountain was carved by dynamite blasts and 450,000 tons of granite was removed from the mountain to carve the four Presidents.  Geologists have estimated that the granite will erode at a rate of only one inch every 10,000 years.  Currently, maintenance teams use silicone sealant to fill any cracks in the faces on Mount Rushmore.
  • The nose on George Washington is longer than the other three, it measures 21 feet and the others measure 20 feet.  Thomas Jefferson was originally intended to be on the right side of Washington but after 18 months of work the granite was deemed unsuitable and was blasted off the mountain and work was restarted on the left side.
  • Borglum had originally planned a large room within the mountain to hold the documents and artifacts that shaped the history of America.  Construction of the Hall of records started in 1938 and by 1939 a 70 foot tunnel was blasted into the mountain.  In 1941, with Borglum’s death and World War II, all work on the memorial including the hall stopped and idea was eventually abandoned.  Then recently in 1998, a teakwood box inside a titanium vault covered by a granite capstone was placed on the floor of the entry hall.  Inside were sixteen porcelain enamel panels, inscribed on the panels are the story of Mount Rushmore explaining why and how it was carved, why these four Presidents were chosen and their biographies, the text of the Declaration of the Independence and the Constitution, and a brief history of the United States to be preserved for the future generations.
  • The Avenue of Flags was established during the celebration of the United States Bicentennial.  There are 56 flags that represent the 50 states, the Washington D.C. district, three U.S. territories and two commonwealths.  The flags are arranged in alphabetical order, if you cannot locate your state’s flag just ask a park ranger for assistance.
  • Mount Rushmore has been used as the location of several movies, including the dramatic chase scene in the 1959 Alfred Hitchcock movie “North by Northwest”.  Recently, the monument was used in the 2004 movie, “National Treasure: Book of Secrets”.  According to the fictitious plot, the monument was constructed to hide the City of Gold.

Crazy Horse 1

Crazy Horse Monument

Crazy Horse was a Lakota chief who defeated General Custer at the battle of Little Bighorn in 1876.  He never signed a treaty with the U.S. government, never learned English and when the other Native Americans were forced onto reservations he never left his home on the Plains.  The Crazy Horse monument is being carved out the Thunderhead Mountain on land that is sacred to the Lakota and honors the famous chief Crazy Horse and also the culture and traditions of the Native Americans.  Originally the monument was commissioned in 1929 at the request of Chief Standing Bear to be sculpted by Korczak Ziolkowski.  In his letter to the sculptor Ziolkowski, Chief Standing Bear said that in response to the carving of Mount Rushmore the Lakota would like “the white man to know that the red man has great heroes, too”.

When looking for an area to start the massive project, Ziolkowski briefly consider a location in the Grand Tetons of Wyoming, but Chief Standing Bear was determined that the monument should be built in the Black Hills of South Dakota, an area which is very important to the Lakota.  Before Ziolkowski started work on the project the federal government offered $10 million in funding but he turned it down stating that he feared his ambitious plans for an educational and cultural center adjacent to the memorial would be rejected if the federal government was involved in the process.

Crazy Horse 2    OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

The Crazy Horse monument was blasting was started in 1948 by Ziolkowski, his wife and seven of their ten children.  The memorial will show Crazy Horse sitting on his horse with his arm outstretched and pointing to the land of the Lakota and when completed it will have the final dimensions of 641 feet wide by 563 feet high.  But Ziolkowski did not live to see the memorial’s competition and died in 1982, since that time work has been continued by the Ziolkowski family.  The head of Crazy Horse was completed in 1998 and is 87 feet high as compared with Mount Rushmore and the heads of the four U.S. Presidents which are each 60 feet high.  When the horse’s head is completed it will be 219 feet high.   Since financing of the project is uncertain and because of the challenges associated with the mountain’s carving, no completion date has been estimated for the Crazy Horse Memorial.

The Crazy Horse Memorial is visited by more than one million people annually.  The visitor complex currently consists of the monument, the Indian Museum of North America and the Native American Cultural Center and is run by the private non-profit organization, the Crazy Horse Memorial Foundation, and receives no federal or state funding.  Eventually, the Crazy Horse memorial will be the centerpiece to a Native American educational and cultural center.  The University and Medical Training Center for the North American Indian will eventually be a satellite campus of the University of South Dakota and will have educational classrooms and a residence hall.  In 2007, T. Denny Sanford made a $2.5 million donation with an additional $5 million paid over a five year period.  In 2010, Paul and Donna Christen announce an additional $5 million donation paid as an endowment to support the operation of the campus and the memorial is also funded by the tourist revenue from admission fees and gift store purchases.  Since 1978, the Crazy Horse Memorial Foundation has awarded more than $1.2 million in scholarships going to Native American students with South Dakota.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Interesting facts about the Crazy Horse Memorial

  • The Crazy Horse Memorial Foundation sponsors many Native American cultural events and educational programs. Each June, the memorial hosts a Volksmarch festival when visitors are permitted onto the mountain and attendance has grown to be over 15,000.
  • Much of the earth-moving equipment used on carving the Crazy Horse monument is donated by corporations with the work primarily supported by visitor fees and gift shop revenues.  Periodically the memorial publicizes blasting events, which attract thousands of people from all over the region. They may wait for hours but can see numerous detonations as rocks and dust are blow from the mountain.  The visitor center contains many pieces of rocks blasted from the mountain and the rocks are available for a small donation.  (My husband, the “Rock Guy”, was very excited about gathering his Crazy Horse rocks and we took several home as souvenirs of our visit!)

The Black Hills of South Dakota has so many historic places to visit and the scenery is absolutely beautiful in this area of the United States.   When we visited in 2004, we stayed for a week because there was so much to see and do.  Custer State Park was our “home base” with daily trips to see several nearby attractions.  Please see last month’s Travel post, Custer State Park, and this month’s posts on Mammoth Site, Wind Cave and Jewel Cave for reports on the other sites to see in Black Hills of South Dakota.

Decor – Framing Small Items

Posted on by

Scattered around our home, there are many small and unusual framed items.  Some of these items are a collection of collectible items or cameos or historic royal medals.  These add personality and interest to our home decorations and are displayed throughout the house.

In my home office, I have recently added two wonderful collectible pieces by Margaret Furlong.  She is an artist located in Oregon that designs beautiful decorative pieces inspired by nature made in bisque porcelain.  The two pieces from her collection currently on the bookshelves in my home office are the “Heaven and Earth” and the “Hope for a New Millennium” which were purchased several years ago and originally were displayed in my daughter’s nursery in our California home.  To create these two framed collectible pieces, I purchased inexpensive gold frames that perfectly fit the Margaret Furlong pieces and two lovely pale green “velvet” scrapbook papers from the local craft store.  I removed the glass and backing from the frames then cut the “velvet” paper to fit the frame using the glass as a template.  I attached the collectible onto the paper with hot glue; carefully making sure that it would be perfectly centered within the frame, and then hot glued the paper with the collectible attached to the frame’s glass for additional support.  Finally, I placed everything back into the gold frame and it was ready to hang on the wall.  This easy craft project took 30 minutes to frame both pieces.  These two framed collectibles are a wonderful example of how to display small items in a beautiful way.

Framed collectible 2     Framed collectible 1

Displayed in my home office is a shadow box that displays commemorative medals of the British Kings and Queens.  As mentioned in this month’s Celebration post, Victoria’s Day, I am fascinated by the British Royal family.  My interest was sparked several years ago when I read a novel about Queen Victoria.  Since that time I have read numerous books about the royal family and while visiting England several years ago I had an opportunity to see the castles and country homes of the royal family which I had been reading about in their biographies.  This inspired a collection of commemorative medals of the British Kings and Queen.  The first one dates back to Queen Victoria and commemorates the Diamond Jubilee and her 60 year reign as Queen of England.  Additional commemorate medals include the coronations of the Kings and Queen that followed, King Edward VII, King George V, King Edward VIII, King George VI and finally the current Queen Elizabeth II.  One very unique pin marks the year 1937 when England had three kings.  During that one year England had three different kings, they were King George V who had recently died at the beginning of 1937, King Edward VII who abdicated before his coronation and then King George VI who was crowned at the end of 1937 and he is the father of the current Queen Elizabeth.  This particular pin is my favorite one in the collection.  All of these seven commemorative pins are in a walnut shadowbox and are wonderful way to display the collection in my home office.

Framed collectible 3   Framed collectible 4

Several years ago while shopping on ebay, I came across a great source for cameos.  I purchased several not knowing exactly what I was going to use them for, originally I was thinking of using them for a jewelry project.  Instead, I decided to frame a lovely blue cameo the same way I framed the Margaret Furlong pieces.  I purchased a small silver frame from the local craft store, dark grey “velvet” scrapbook paper and used the same process, it worked out beautifully.  The framed cameo now sits on the side table in our master bedroom and is a lovely decorative accent.

Down in our basement there is a bookshelf which is filled with family memorabilia (in the future I should write a post regarding the bookshelf and how everything is displayed!)  Anyway, there is a very special piece that commemorates our daughter’s baptism and the story behind this piece is very interesting.  First, I need to explain that both my mother’s parents emigrated from Poland through Ellis Island in the early 1900s.  Needless to say when Pope John Paul II became pope in 1978 my mother was very excited.  Several years ago when I was working on a special 80th birthday book for my mother, I wrote to the Pope hoping that he would respond and to my surprise he did write back with a lovely letter wishing her a happy birthday.  To conclude the story, when it came time for my daughter’s baptism, I again wrote to Pope John Paul II and received a letter blessing her on this special occasion and enclosed with the letter was a very special medal for her.  I copied the letter, reduced the size to fit the frame I had purchased, the original letter went into her baby book, and in the small shadowbox I included the medal the Pope sent along with a photo taken at her baptism.  This is an example of a very small item, the medal, being displayed in a wonderful way to commemorate a special and blessed event.

Framed collectible 1a

In the entertainment center down in the basement are several walnut cases specially made with a black liner and they are perfect for holding a collection of pins gathered during our road trips and overseas travels.  Almost every place visited on our travels I will purchase a pin as a souvenir and over the years I have collected hundreds.  Most of these pins are displayed in these special large walnut cases.  Check out this month’s Décor post, Travel Souvenirs, for more information regarding the other items we collect during our vacations and how they are displayed in our home.  Two small walnut cases are also displayed in the entertainment center.  One case holds a collection of Hard Rock Café guitar pins that were purchased while dining at the restaurants in several U.S. cities and other locations in Europe and Asia.  We like the food at the Hard Rock Café and if we are visiting a particular city on our travels I always check to see if there is one located there.  As mentioned in a previous post, Disney Memorabilia Collection, part of our Disneyland souvenirs is a collection of over two hundred Disney collectible pins.  Most of these pins were purchased during our visits to Disneyland or online from e-bay when I am looking for rare or discontinued pins.  A small part of the pin collection is displayed in one of the small walnut cases and the rest of the pins are stored away.  These walnut cases are an example of a terrific way to display a collection of small items and sometimes when we are down in the basement watching movies I will pull out one of the walnut cases and look at the pins and remember the places we have visited.

Pin collection 2    Pin collection 1
Pin collection 4    Pin collection 3

So, when you are purchasing small decorative items, think about displaying them in small frames that would look wonderful on bookshelves or tables in your home.  If you are a collector of small items like pins and medals, think about displaying the items together in shadowbox frames or special cases that are made specifically for this purpose.  My basic idea is that if you have purchased and collected these items take some time to display them in a decorative way to enjoy every day.  This idea is also a wonderful way to add interest and personality to a home.

Celebration – Mother’s Day

Posted on by

mothers day lilacMother’s Day is coming up this month and (hopefully) sons and daughters around the country will be remembering their mothers.  Traditionally Mother’s Day is an annual holiday celebrated on the second Sunday in May.  This special day is meant to recognize mothers and acknowledge their contributions to our lives through their care and support of their families.

A Brief History of Mother’s Day

Back in 1868, there was committee establish by Ann Jarvis with the purpose to reunite families that had been divided by the Civil War.  Previously she had organized a “Mother’s Day Work Club” during the war to improve the sanitation and health conditions in both the Union and Confederate encampments at the time of a severe typhoid outbreak.  After the war, she continued her efforts to establish an annual memorial day to honor the service of these dedicated women who had work so hard for their sons during and after the Civil War.  There were only limited celebrations at a local level and unfortunately the idea never became popular at a national level during her lifetime and Jarvis died in 1905.

After her mother’s death, her daughter Anna Jarvis worked with a Philadelphia businessman named John Wanamaker to organize a small service at a local church in West Virginia where her mother taught Sunday school and this celebration honoring her mother took place in 1907.  In the following year, 1908, the first “official” Mother’s Day celebration was held again at the same local church in West Virginia while on the same day a much larger celebration was held at the Wanamaker store in Philadelphia.  Then, the next year there was an even larger celebration was held in New York City.

Jarvis worked to establish Mother’s Day as an official United States national holiday and in 1910 West Virginia was the first state to established it an official holiday.  In 1914, the U.S. Congress passed a law designating the second Sunday in May as Mother’s Day and President Woodrow Wilson issued a proclamation declaring the first national Mother’s Day as a day for American citizens to honor those mothers whose sons had died in the war.

Eventually the Mother’s Day holiday celebration became overly commercialized and the original meaning of the holiday was quickly lost.  In a strange twist, Anna Jarvis, the women who worked so hard to establish an annual Mother’s Day to honor her mother and the mothers of sons that died in the war, became a major opponent of the commercialization of the holiday.  She spoke out against the practice of purchasing greeting cards when people became “too lazy to write personal letters” to their mothers.  She was so strong in her opinion that she “wished she would have never started the day because it became so out of control” and she was even arrested in 1948 for disturbing the peace while protesting against the commercialization of Mother’s Day.

Mother’s Day is now one of the most commercially successful American holidays.  It has become the most popular day of the year to dine out at a restaurant and it generates a large portion of the U .S. jewelry industry’s annual revenue from custom gifts like the mother’s ring.  (I must admit that we bought my mother one of these rings with the birthstones of her for daughters)  Americans also spend approximately $68 million on greeting cards, $2.6 billion on flowers and over $1.53 billion on the recent idea giving gifts to pamper our mothers like spa treatments.

Mother’s Day Gift Ideas and Suggestions

Mother’s Day gifts are available in wide range of prices, from the very expensive and extravagant to the inexpensive, thoughtful and very personal hand crafted items.  Listed below are some great gift ideas for Mother’s Day:

  1. Breakfast in bed – this idea can be as extravagant as a catered meal to a special menu planned and cooked by the kids with the supervision of their father.  As an extra special touch consider serving the meal on custom hand-painted plate by the kids and purchased from the local pottery store.  (this idea needs to be planned in advance because there is usually a processing time to pick up a completed fire-kilned plate)
  2. Flowers – these can range from expensive florist shop flowers, to ones purchased at the local grocery store, to ones hand-picked from the garden, to tissue paper flowers made by the kids.
  3. Jewelry – the price range can be from an expensive necklace, bracelet or ring to inexpensive hand-beaded items made by the kids (macaroni necklaces can be charming idea but check out the jewelry aisle at the local craft store for something a mom could wear everyday)
  4. Gifts to pamper – ideas can range from a gift certificate to the local spa for a massage or facial to expensive perfumes, bath salts or lotions from the local upscale retail department store, to bath and beauty products from a store like Bath and Body Works.
  5. Family photographs – this can range from a formal/informal portrait by a local professional photograph either in a studio or at a special outdoor location or maybe some casual photos of the kids shot at home or in the backyard.  Remember to present the photographs in a beautiful frame either professional matted and framed at a studio or done with supplies from the local craft store.  Don’t forget that older photos also make great gifts, take a look at the family photo albums and I’m sure you would be able to find that perfect photo to copy and frame.  Look for old family photos of her parents and grandparents or maybe a photo taken of her with her baby on the day he/she was born.
  6. Clothing – When purchasing clothes it is a could idea to know sizes for purchasing a beautiful dress or lovely blouse, just try to decide on something a little more special than a pair of jeans or a t-shirt.  If you don’t know the size, consider a fabulous handbag.  If you can’t find anything she would like, think about a gift certificate to one of her favorite stores and with the card include a special note with an offer to babysit the kids while she is shopping!

Please check out this month’s Craft posts, Floral Purses and Childhood Handprints, for complete instructions and supply lists for two great craft project to create for Mother’s Day.

Mother’s Day Trivia

  • The Grafton Church in West Virginia, where the first “official” Mother’s Day celebration was held in honor of Ann Jarvis is now a National Historic Landmark.
  • In 1934, U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt approved a stamp commemorating the Mother’s Day annual holiday.
  • Carnations have long been associated with Mother’s Day when Anna Jarvis distributed 500 white carnations at the first “official” celebration in 1908.  The carnation was chosen because it was her mother’s favorite flower.  Since that time, many churches have adopted the custom of giving carnations at their Sunday services on Mother’s Day.
  • When there was a shortage of white carnations for Mother’s Day, the floral industry invented the idea of wearing a red carnation if your mother was living or a white one if she had passed away.  This idea was so heavily promoted by the florists that evenly became a very popular custom.

Craft – Childhood Handprints

Posted on by

Child's handprintMother’s day is coming up this month and here is an easy and inexpensive craft project to do with the kids to create a very sentimental Mother’s Day gift.  This idea is also a great gift idea for Father’s Day, Grandparent’s Day or Christmas.

Children handprints, especially when they are very young, always make interesting art work for a home.  When children are at the preschool or kindergarten age their hands are very small and they make excellent tools for these simple art projects.

Follow these simple steps for a perfect handprint craft/art project.

  1. Before starting this craft project, be sure to assemble all the materials that you will need.  I used both acrylic black and brown paint for several sets of handprints. (I wasn’t sure which color I wanted to use so I took a couple of sets in each different color so that I would have more options to decide from when I did this project with my daughter)
  2. You will also need a paint brush to apply the paint onto the palm of the child’s hand.
  3. A very important tip when making handprints and using paint is to cover the work area completely with newspaper or a plastic tablecloth.  Another tip is to use an inexpensive apron to cover you and the child’s clothing while taking the handprints or another inexpensive solution is an oversized t-shirt, just be sure it is one that can be thrown out if it gets too much paint.  Position the work space within easy reach of a sink with running water and have paper towels on hand for spills and clean-up.  These simple steps will keep the project from getting too messy and therefore the clean-up time will be kept to a minimum.
  4. For this particular craft project pre-select a poem to use with the handprints.  The internet is a good source to find an appropriate poem, do a search for “handprint poem” and select one that you like.  Center the poem near the top of the page to allow enough room at the bottom for the handprints.  Be sure to include the name of the child and the year the handprint was taken.  Print several copies from a computer.  (I recommend at least four copies to start, this should be enough to allow for mistakes and to get at least one set of good handprints)
  5. Before starting the project take the time to explain to the child what will happen during the handprint process, children tend to cooperate more if they know what to expect.  A simple trick to taking good handprints is for the child to relax their hands and not roll their fingers into a ball.  This can be a very messy process if you have to move their fingers into a straight position.
  6. An important tip when taking handprints is to use a minimum amount of paint to create smudge-free prints.  Place the palm of the hand near the wrist down first and then place the fingers slowly down on the paper. Once the hand is completely placed, gently press down on all the areas of the hand with equal pressure for an even print.  Rest the hand for a moment and then lift straight up, this trick will help to eliminate smudges.  After you get a good handprint of the first hand move onto the second hand.
  7. After the both handprints are taken, allow it to dry for at least 24 hours.  Once the handprint is completely dry.

Please check out last month’s Craft post, Zoo Animal HandPrints, for another fun craft project using children’s handprints.

Craft – Floral Purse Arrangement

Posted on by

Floral purse green 2

With Mother’s Day celebrated this month, why not consider creating one of these floral purses as a lovely gift.  This beautiful floral purse gift would also be a fun idea for a present for a daughter’s sweet sixteen or a best friend’s birthday.  This gift would also make a great bridal or wedding shower gift and for additional suggestions please check out the ideas at the end of this post.

To get stated creating one of these floral purses, just follow a few easy steps to create this amazing gift!

Floral purse green 1Floral Purse – instructions

  1. To assemble a floral purse gift, the first thing to do is to find a great purse to use as the base for the floral arrangement.  Look for a beautiful purse in a local retail store or consider a vintage purse from an antique store.
  2. Before adding anything else to the purse, fill the bottom with tissue paper or a layer of small glass marbles if you need to add weight to the purse to keep it from tipping over.
  3. Next, depending on the color and style of the purse, add some flowers and greenery to coordinate.  Any type of flowers can be used, such as: roses, sunflowers, tulips, etc.  Don’t forget to use some greenery or berry sprays to add some accent color to compliment the flowers and the purse.
  4. Add some small additional gifts.  Consider one or two jewelry items, such as: a beautiful broach attached to the purse or artistically drape a necklace or bracelet among the flowers.  Consider other small gift items, such as: a wonderful perfume, body sprays and lotions or a collection of beauty products.
  5. Finally, be sure to attach a gift tag to the handle of the purse or tuck a birthday card into the flowers.

Floral purse green 3Floral purse gift ideas and suggestions

  1. A fun gift idea for a young girl’s sweet sixteen birthday gift is to purchase a fabulous designer bag, add some flowers and greenery.  Next, add some gift cards to their favorite stores or spa and nail salon certificates, tuck them into the flowers for an extra special present.  (The same idea could be used for a friend’s birthday gift)
  2. This idea could also be used for a wedding shower gift idea, consider adding gift cards from the store where the bridal couple has their registry.  For a kitchen themed shower, add several kitchen utensils and maybe a couple of favorite or family recipes written out on some cute recipe cards.
  3. For a daughter’s bridal shower, consider giving a lovely bridal purse for her to carry on her wedding day.  Think about adding something old, something new and something blue!  A family locket necklace, grandma’s broach, a vintage handkerchief or maybe even their first communion rosary for something old.  Something new could be the wedding purse or maybe new earrings, a bracelet or a necklace to wear on the wedding day.  Something blue could be a lovely blue garter or perhaps a pair of sapphire earrings or a blue handkerchief.  Don’t forget to put a lucky penny into the bottom of the purse!
  4. For a bridesmaid luncheon, the bride could consider giving matching purses for the bridesmaids to use on the wedding day and maybe artistically hanging matching necklaces among the flowers.  Don’t forget to attach a thank you note from the bride letting each one know how much she values their friendship and how excited she is to have them share in her special day.
  5. For a baby shower, use a beautiful diaper bag.  Fill it with a floral arrangement and tuck in several small baby items, maybe even toys.
  6. This idea could also be used for creating a lovely floral arrangement for a bedroom dresser or nightstand for a home.  The floral purse pictured in this post sits on the shelf in my master bedroom closet and it is the perfect decoration for the room!!