I showed you the centerpieces we made for the Gala yesterday. They are super easy to make. 



I ordered 24" eiffel tower vases. They come in clear, white, or frosted. I wanted to use
 frosted vases because it would hide the 6" stem of the foam bouquet holder and the
 lights. But, they were several dollars more a piece than the clear. 

So, I ordered the clear and bought Frosting Spray {around $5/can at Lowes} and
sprayed several light coats on each. 1 can did about 10 vases.



Here they are after getting their frosting.

 Once we got to Harrah's, we lined the vases up and placed a foam bouquet 
holder in each. {see how the frosting helps to hide the stem}
 




I bought 2 sizes of ostrich feathers. The most affordable way to buy the {expensive}
 feathers is by the pound. One pound of the taller {21-24"} feathers had around 170
feathers. The shorter wing tips {14-17"} came with around 200 feathers per pound. 

**Tip--if you order by the pound, count your feathers and make sure you have the quoted amount. Don't assume
they are correct. I was shorted 250 feathers!! That's 8 arrangements!! They did, however send me the additional ones**

I used 14 tall and 14 short {wing tips} feathers per arrangement.  We started around the
 bottom of the foam holder with a row of 5-7 of the longest feathers pushed in on a 45
degree angle. Then, moving up the holder, created another row using both long and
short {around 5-6}. We continued creating rows until we were straight up in the middle.       



{my awesome assistants, Angie and that's Heather hiding}

It is best to make your arrangements at least one day in advance. The feathers will relax
and fall a little over night. There were 5 of us making these and we made 42 in about an hour.

We lined them all up as we finished each one.


    

Once they were all finished we moved them into the Event Center.





Notice that they are lit up?! The vase was placed on a 4" LED disc that contained 9 lights.
 These discs came with 3 AA batteries and an on/off switch {$12}. They are so bright that not
only do they light up the vase but also the underneath side of the feathers.        



These discs were not my Plan A. I bought little battery operated LED tea
 lights that were supposed to fit into the vase.





These were fairly inexpensive {$2/pc} and I planned on using 3 in each vase.
Great in theory, but the vases were only 3/4" wide in the
middle {skinniest part} and the lights were 3/4" tall.    





The light discs ended up working so beautifully and they can be reused in next years gala.

With the addition of the feathers, we ended up with a 40" tall arrangement. This is great
 because it in no way blocks your view while talking to others at your table. But, as you can
 see, the bottom of the vase is super small--and it was placed on the 4" light disc. This made
 me a little nervous thinking that someone might knock into a table and end up with feathers
 in their martinis.

I decided to attach the vase to the light disc with zots dots.


   


{thanks to my friend Donna for giving me a box of these!}


I used 4 of these super sticky dots on the bottom of each vase and then stuck them 
down onto their light disc. They are not permanent, but, you have to work super hard
 to pull them apart! 





Since we still had the tealights, I wanted to add even more drama to the top
of the feathers by dropping a tealight into the middle of the feathers resting on top of
 the foam bouquet holder. There are so many feathers in the foam that it balanced
itself without needing anything else.

Just the one light added so much drama to the arrangement and allowed the middle
of the feathers, all the way to the tips, to glow. 






Jordan and Shelby made gold metallic table numbers that they threaded on a 
black tasseled rope.

 
 


They picked up the bouquet holder and placed the other end of the rope into the vase
and then placed the feathered bouquet holder back in, securing it in place.