Friday, July 13, 2018

How to Make Store Bought Bouqets Look Great! 2018

This fearless, awesome group met just a few weeks ago. Hold onto summer by admiring these beautiful "after"pieces!
 













Tuesday, July 10, 2018

A Wedding bouquet





I was practicing a new technique for making a cascading bouquet for a bride recently and ended up making two bouquets. This one didn't make the grade.  

Some weddings are planned out in advance and you get to know the bride and groom quite well. It's a strange kind of intimacy. Usually the affair lasts only till the day of the wedding.You can be in contact daily, exchanging photos, thoughts and a creative journey. Then- it's over. The little flower world you have created is taken apart and dispatched. Sigh... 

Other's are a simple delivery request for flowers without fanfare or much knowledge of flowers on the bride's part. As was the case for this cascading bouquet. The once standard meet and greet in person is now done by email. So I didn't meet Sarah till the delivery. She paused (not all women in this state of preparation do) and seemed truly delighted. The flowers for this wedding, with the garden roses and dusky pink carnations was one of the most scented groups I've made. Making them was a feast for the senses. It made me wish that I had been making them for a couple I had more of an the opportunity to connect with. 

Ah well. Regardless of the depth of the relationship, I give the best I have. Keeping that effort true and strong is what matters and requires as much intention as practicing any mechanical technique.




Monday, July 9, 2018

Aurora Bell, Chapter 3

My cat told me that it is here. She is on red alert; her tail smacking the bookshelf perch that allows a bird's eye view of all the action on the quiet side street below our second story. The coyote is back. Every day once or twice a day, it passes to and from it's territory in the hidden creek nearby. I run downstairs and chase it off when I see it, "hazing" it's called and recommended by the nearby Wildcare Facility -so that coyotes don't get too comfortable in urban settings.

Aurora Bell has in fact been up close and personal with Mr. Coyote. A few weeks  back a neighbor called to tell me that she and this young male coyote were sitting was only 3 feet from each other. By the time I got outside he and she were circling round a car. Inter species friendship or stalking? Not going to find that one out. So now she is a mostly indoor cat.  A move neither of us ever expected down the the urban flat lands of Gerstle Park. I feel bad for her. She's young and loved to roam. Time for a different life.


Six weeks later finds me crouching down in the bushes across that little side street. My neighbor drives by and I poke my head up and nod. Hmmm... what is she doing, they might briefly ponder. Why I am on a cat walk with Aurora. She is now somewhat leash trained, which means she doesn't spring up vertically anymore at loud sounds and wiggle out of her harness. 

Cat time.... At first I was rather annoyed by the inconvenience of giving her a daily outside time, rather than just enforce an indoor life. But how could I do that? Outside time is supervised time, off leash in the yard and on leash out of it. I have to watch her so there is little time for weeding or doing tasks in the garden. I can take my phone out and answer some texts, but mainly I am following her. Her pattern is arrive, roll, lay and what? Asses her domain? Then move on. We repeat this here and there and there, which sometimes takes me into the bushes and other odd places that I didn't realize I would be squatting, sitting and waiting on a daily basis.






 
Now I mostly enjoy this little enforced meditation. Do nothing. Enjoy the garden without seeing it as one giant to-do list, see the neighborhood from a new perspective. Breath.




             And spend time with my girl.