Friday, April 07, 2006

Flower Power - a fun way to spend a few hours


The arrangement for today was to create a spring arrangment in a basket. Here are some of our group at the end of the afternoon with a table display of the arrangments.



We are all different abilities, but do it for fun. The red carnation spiral arrangement and the white spiral arrangement were made for a church flower show, so are a different design.

Some of the arrangements contain summer flowers like gerbera and roses and others due to the lack of spring flowers in the shops. Some of the ladies did get tulips, daffodils, narcissi, and irises from a store in Thetford - too far for me to travel to - it would cost me far more in fuel than for the flowers.



Brenda out tutor is the lady in the blue cardigan - she is a NAFAS National Demonstratot too, so we are really lucky to have her for our group.



This is the photo of mine taken at the village hall.



This is my arrangement at home - not a very good photo. It looks a bit washed out. The colours are farm more bright and vibrant, the daffs more yellow, the hellebores are speckled with dark read and the others lower down are a lovely deep pinky colour that match the speckles on the green and cream ones.

The contorted willow stems have lovely lime green leaves which will soon burst open more, and they extend in and out of the arrangement which I had to crop out but look lovely they way they twist and turn creating nice shapes.

There were so many lovely arrangements - very professional, but I quite like my effort and it was mainly from my garden and the daffodils I used cost 50 pence as I used half a bunch. So a spring arrangement for 50p has to be a bargain! Apart from the daffodils, all the other flowers and foliage were from my garden.

The arrangement will be placed on my low coffee table in front of the patio door - which is a classic design so will suit it perfectly. I only took the photo against the cream background so that it was easier to show the design.

The daffodils I had left over I popped into a container and made a quick open arrangement - will post a photo tomorrow when the daffs have opened in the warmth of the room.

6 comments:

  1. your flower piece looks real nice. You did well. wish you could have picked my tulips you would have won but guess the gas to here would have been a little out of sight.

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  2. Anonymous2:09 am

    I love it! How do you keep hellebores from wilting as cut flowers? Mine droop immediately unless I pick just the blossoms and float them in a dish.

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  3. Hi Patsy - yes tulips would have been nice. Our tutor says that the growers are holding them back as it is Easter next weekend so they fetch far more money.

    They do that for all the major holidays in Europe and I don't blame them - they all have to make a living.

    This wasn't a competition, it was just a workshop where you all meet up and have a go. A fun thing. The tutor will go around and 'twiddle' or advise or help anyone who needs it - or just have a friendly chat.

    Molly
    Thanks. My hellebores I pick early in the morning when they are turgid, and plunge them straight away into a bucke of deep water to which flower food has been added.

    I really 'hurt' to be cutting some stems I can tell you!

    Thanks to you both for your comments

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  4. Lovely freash design! I'll bet the smaller one at home will look just as good too!
    I'm a bit of a 'plonk it in a vase arranger'! I sometimes use glass beads in the bottom of the vase to give the stems a bit of support, don't think I'd win any prizes LOL!

    Have put my house on the market, as from today! It will be in the 'shop' window,I'm going to have to keep it clean and tidy....cats don't understand clean and tidy though, especially with a fresh pile of laundry...the perfect bed for them LOL! I shall just have to move faster and shift the towels next time.
    The promised pics will have to wait as the Estate agent said I could have my first viewins next weekend... hope they don't open the wardrobe doors... AVALANCHE!

    Back later on my blog.
    Enjoy the sunshine!

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  5. That top photo almost looks 3D....good one.
    And your design was delightful.

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  6. Thank you LM is does doesn't it. My arrangement looks nicer in real life - just natural and spring like, and I like it because everything was from my garden except the daffs. It is looking better today as the leaves are opening in the twigs, and the daffs have opened too.

    Thanks for your nice comment

    Off to look at your blog

    ReplyDelete

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