FLOWER Power!

Fresh flowers from the garden at work for "Music and Company" Father's Day Celebration

One of the ways I have been amusing myself in this season of my life, is with flowers.  I always welcome the opportunity to play.  I can put aside all the cares of life and lose myself in the process of cleaning the flowers, setting them out in groups, preparing the container and then arranging them - trying to keep in mind all that I learned in "Floral Design - Part One". 

Sometimes the flowers have been for a special occasion.  Sometimes I have created an excuse to bring them in - "Happy 150th day of the year" ; "Sorry for your loss of a filling"; "You're Retiring already?" ; "My kids are bugging me arrangement"; etc. etc.

These two arrangements were done for my boss who was retiring.  We put on a party for her and I signed up to do the arrangements for the head table.  I bought an every day arrangement at Costco, took it apart and put my own signature on them.  I didn't have quite enough product for two whole arrangements, so I topped up the one, with some of the flowers from my garden.  Imagine my surprise at finding yellow day lilies in my garden (didn't know I had planted them!) at 10 o'clock at night.  They added just the right touch to the second arrangement!

Retirement Party - Head table arrangement #1

The other arrangement for the Retirement Party 

Along with the flower arrangements, I tried my hand at a wrist corsage, so the guest of honour could dance the night away without worrying about a corsage being crushed.  I asked my work friend to 'pray the prayer of the wrist corsage' for me, because I was completely unsure of how to put it together.  We didn't cover wrist corsages in "Part One".  I watched several YouTube videos on how to do this.  They all said something different.  So I called my friend who did all the flowers for my daughter's wedding.  I texted her pictures of what I was doing and she texted back instructions.  It worked!  It made me wonder what did people do before the days of YouTube and texting pictures to get their technique down?

One of the things I added to the garden this year, was a hanging basket on the hook that was on the tree when we moved into The Pokeaway.  For five years, I have looked at that hook and said "Next year, I'm going to hang a basket on there".  It brought me such pleasure to look out the window of the dining room and see the flowers there.  Unfortunately, the hook gave way shortly after we hung the basket.  But good news!  Now I have three hanging baskets at the front of the house instead of two!

These flowers I have already blogged about.  Do you remember when?  No matter!  I enjoyed them for as long as they bloomed.  

And these ones were given away to someone.  Although I no longer remember who!  I particularly like the calla lily on the right. It gave the arrangement a special signature.

One of the advantages of offering to do an arrangement on behalf of the work-circle to offer support for a co-worker who is struggling with health issues, is that if there are left-overs I can make a little arrangement for my dresser, that I can enjoy myself.

Left-over flowers make a nice dresser arrangement

And when a friend brought me over the yellow flowers, I had the opportunity to add from my own collection and make something that would grace the coffee table for that extra special touch.

They say that flowers speak volumes.  I agree.  My instructor told some great stories about customers coming in to get flowers to say "I'm sorry", "I care", "I don't care anymore", "Celebrate!" "Commiserate ..." etc.  These tulips called my name one day when I was shopping for milk.  They said "Pretend these are from your kids".  I was completely surprised!  I have such great kids!  This arrangement just confirmed it.

Thanks, kids!

Not too long ago, a friend brought me alstromeria in a bunch and I had fun putting them along the window - they have lasted and brought me such pleasure for many days.  And they make my window look like a Pinterest pin!

Today, I am going to lunch with a friend who has just entered the world of "GRAMMA". 

To celebrate with her, 

 I picked these from my garden

to make this:

I love a fresh-cut celebration!