DIY - Honey Bear Succulent Vases

Succulents are far and away my favorite plant and these adorable vases are a way to make a good thing even better. They make amazingly unique centerpieces for a special occasion that your guests won't stop talking about or are a perfect addition to a kitchen window sill, that will just make you smile. Part of the fun was arranging different little floral arrangements in each honey bear. Big thanks to Flower For Dreams for supplying us with the blooms. With every bouquet you purchase they make a donation to a specific charity of the month (BrightPink is this months cause)

Click through the link below to get easy step by step directions for this cute DIY project.

Click the link below to get started!

Materials Needed:
Empty Plastic Honey Bear
White Spray Paint for Plastic
Gold Spray Paint
Selection of cut succulents or other blooms

Tools Needed:
Goo Gone
Alcohol
Q-tips
Cardboard Box

Directions: 
1. If you have a honey bear container in your kitchen use the remaining honey and hand wash it with soap and hot water (don't throw it in the dishwasher because it could melt). I collected these guys over a period of a couple of months, but you can also find brand new virgin honey bears that have never been used on places like Ebay or Amazon and skip the first couple of steps.

2. Use Goo Gone to remove the label or any remanent of stickiness from the honey bear bottle.

3. If your honey bear has a black nose and/or eyes remove them with rubbing alcohol and a q-tip. I learned about this the hard way and had to start over after my bear got major mascara runs once I applied the spray paint! 

4. I used Krylon Fusion For Platic Flat White Paint as a base coat and then sprayed on Krylon Gold Plate. Make sure to wear plastic gloves cuz your mitts will get messy. You may be able to skip the base coat and just go for the gold, however I've had bad experiences with gold spray paint flaking off so I thought this was a nice way to make the vases more durable. (I'd be interested to hear about other peoples experiences on this...)

5. Use an old cardboard box to spray paint the bears. Just cut the front side of the box open and line up your bears 3-4 inches away from each other . Shake the spray paint for a a good minute or two and then hold the ban 8-12 inches from the bears and spray gently with a sweeping motion. I also found that it was easy pick up the bears with your gloved fingers in the top hole and rotate and spray them this way. Allow the base coat to dry for at least 15 minutes. 

6. Once the base coat has dried it's time for the glorious gold spray paint. Using the same techniques outlined above, I put on two gold coats and waited 15 minutes between each. After the second coat has dried wait at least an hour for the paint to really set before handling. 

7. For an optional finishing touch you can spray paint the nipple ring of a baby bottle in the same fashion outlined above and use krazy glue (or any other adhesive that is good for plastic on plastic) to adhere it to the top. 

8. After your bears have completely dried and set (I reccomend waiting at least an hour or two). You can fill them up halfway with water and start arranging your blooms. We were super lucky to work with Flowers For Dreams on this project and they supplied us with a bunch of really beautiful flowers.

9. Get creative and arrange away. This is definitely the best part!

Be on the look out in the next couple of weeks for a delicious recipe that shows what we did with all this honey!!!

Also the original inspiration for this post allows you to buy and just skip the DIY. Check out Demetria Chappo Ceramics on Scout Mob and order a sweet white porcelain honey bear without getting your hands dirty.