Friday flowers (crafty edition - take II, the evolution)

I'm still playing with these. I added some succulents and mixed in some candles.

{succulents, candles, paper flowers}

I think we'd need to use clear glass cylinders instead of mason jars. The jars photograph well, but in real life the embossed writing obscures your view of the succulents. I'd also use something other than dirty gravel that I scraped out of the yard, in case you were wondering about that.

{succulents, candles, paper flowers}

I'd like to have taller candleholders that could fit actual votives instead of tealights, but we have about 200 of these already (leftover from my sister's wedding). I'm still trying to decide how likely it is that the candles will set the paper flowers on fire. (Probably likely, if the flowers are loose and people start playing with them. Potentially less likely, if I glue all the flowers in place.)

The succulents weren't chosen specifically - they're just pups (baby succulents!) that my mom had lying around, waiting to be planted. That's part of what makes the succulents do-able for us. My parents already have a huge native garden to pull from.

This prototyping part is fun. Figuring out how many square feet of space you need per person for different seating layouts? Decidedly less fun. But much more important. So we're doing that stuff too. 

Friday flowers (crafty edition)

At approximately 11:35 pm last Thursday, I got this image in my head of a carpet of paper flowers. But not tissue paper ones - they were flowers with heft, tinted with watercolors. Structural, if you will. And they could be clustered thickly, thus the carpet image, and they would be so easy to toss on tables as wedding centerpieces, without fear of wilting. I tried to explain this to D and he told me to go to sleep. So I did.

But the next evening ...

{paper flowers}

$5 worth of supplies + nearly 8 hours of hard labor. Totally do-able, right? D is still not completely sold - he is kind of attached to succulents, which are also easy to set out and unlikely to wilt and require far less time.

Still and all ....

{paper flowers}

I'm hoping that our current household wedding obsession will calm down once we have our design finalized. Otherwise, you guys might be in for several months of half started projects and wedding babble. We should never have opened these floodgates.

Friday flowers

A simple little arrangement.

{white, purple, green}

I think the cropping of photos is so interesting - I don't crop post-photo for some reason, but I almost always take a range of distance shots and then pick and choose. It can totally change the feeling.

Close in ...

{simple bouquet}

Way out ...

{white, purple, green}

I used to try to tidy up for my flower shots, but I don't anymore, for the most part.

Friday flowers

Guys, we have a house plant. It was a Christmas gift and so far it is still alive and hasn't been watered or anything. I haven't had to start reading gardening books.

{agave}

I'm tentatively calling it a success. But I'm refusing to get too attached. I've killed enough orchids over the years to know a thing or two about that.

Friday flowers

The china mums from last week still look perfectly fresh - if anyone is looking for a long lasting flower, these appear to be a good bet. I put two of them in my bathroom and they definitely distract from my scattered makeup and the clumps of hair on the counter. Or so I tell myself.

{china mums, week 2}

At least one more venue visit this weekend and I'll probably report on progress next week. This part is tough, kids.

{china mums, week 2}

Friday flowers

Bright yellow china mums, to combat the generally dreary weather we've had for a few weeks.

{china mums}

Oh yes, that's our Christmas tree in the background. We initially planned to have it down by New Year's day, but now we're aiming for sometime before Valentine's.

{china mums}

Friday flowers

A fistful of freesia, oddly out of season but still fragrant and graceful.

{freesia, table}

They're one of my favorites so I couldn't resist even though they seem a bit out of place when you can see Christmas lights twinkling in the background.

{freesia}

Another packed weekend coming up, but then I should have a few quiet days next week. I have lots of kitchen time planned and hopefully I'll manage to fit some sewing in as well. We're going super minimal with gifts (none between D and me, stockings only with the family), so I don't have much to do in that department but it's always nice to get a few little things made up.

Friday flowers

Small and simple this week ... and I was too busy to get any pictures until it was already dark.

{flowers, lights, satsuma}

Big weekend coming up - a dear friend's baby shower + a few birthdays + the annual family gingerbread party. I'll try not to give myself any permanent scars (I still have a pretty gnarly one that goes all the way around my wrist from last year).

{flowers, lights}

Friday flowers

I rescued a few of the yellow flowers from my pre-Thanksgiving bouquet and made a tiny arrangement, only slightly dying. D picked up some simple white flowers from the farmer's market, so this week we have a bounty.

{white + yellow}

I think that white and green is one of my favorite color combos lately.

{white flowers, green leaves}

This is our only free weekend for the entire month of December (now that I think about it, we might not even have a free day for the rest of the month, let alone two) and we haven't figured out how to spend it. I'm sure it will fill up quickly. I'm hoping the Christmas tea I ordered arrives so I can revel in it for as much of the month as possible.

Friday flowers

Picked this up at TJs, loving the mishmash of textures and colors.

{fall flowers}

I usually end up pulling out a lot of the greenery, but I liked the dark green of the leaves against the peaches and yellows.

{mixed bouquet for fall}

I'll be doing lots of Thanksgiving planning this weekend, nailing down timing and picking out side dishes. I love a good cooking schedule - everything gets an assigned time slot in the oven and the schedule gets posted in the kitchen the day before. Huge meals are all about the game plan.

Friday flowers

A very simple mixed bouquet, in a new (to me) milk glass vase (thanks, Mom!).

{mixed bouquet}

Sitting on the sewing chest, which now lives next to the couch.

{coxcomb}

Friday flowers

Dahlias, in the tiniest of jam jars.

{dahlias, jam jar}

I've been playing more with my 50 mm lens lately. Shooting wide open (keeping the f stop at 1.8) gives you that lovely blur in the background, which is also helpful for distracting the eye from the chronically busy condition of our dining room table.

{dahlias, jam jar, table}

Interestingly enough, this is sort of how the world looks to me without my glasses on (I'm almost unbelievably nearsighted) - perhaps that's why I find it so appealing.

Friday flowers

Thank you all for your sweet comments yesterday - I love reading your little stories. If you didn't get a chance to enter the book giveaway, get in there in the next few hours. I'll select winners sometime this evening - I know it's a short window of opportunity, but that increases the chances of winning for those of you who've entered, which is nice.

And there are flowers ...

{tea roses, chair}

Tea roses in a shade of orange-y pink that I can never resist. I have a rosebush of my very own back at home, one that I was allowed to pick out when I was a little girl, and it has roses of a similar color. I am prejudiced, of course, but I believe they are the most beautiful.

{tea roses, close}

I frequently claim to not care about roses, but they pop up here rather frequently. I suppose I should amend that to say that I don't care much for the standard deep red roses. Or maybe I shouldn't say anything at all, in case I jinx myself and suddenly feel compelled to start purchasing them by the dozen, complete with accents of glossy ferns and baby's breath. You guys, if that ever happens, please stop me. Real friends would tell you if your blog was looking like an 80's prom date.

Friday flowers (early and rambly edition)

The tail end of the garden roses (I think), waiting for me at my parents' house last weekend. I arranged them, loosely.

{garden roses}

They're so fully bloomed that they start to fall apart after a day or two and require careful handling. I didn't dare transport them by car, so I left them. Knowing they exist is good enough.

And I do know that it's Thursday, not Friday. Sorry if I faked anyone out. I feel a little drained this week and my mind is scattered and I don't have anything useful to contribute. Here are some random bits and pieces that don't really deserve their own posts but are taking up my head space ...

I'm trying to reduce the amount of carbs I eat this week as an experiment and I've discovered that I basically live for carbs. As in, if I know carbs are off limits for random snacking then I will just throw up my hands and decide I'm not really hungry, even if I am. Crankiness ensures. Note that I'm not crazy enough to attempt to eat no carbs at all, I'm just not adding superfluous bread and crackers to my day and even that is hard. Luckily it's just for one week. I'm a wimp. How do people do this for extended periods of time?

We had a cold snap! It felt a little like fall. So naturally my head starts spinning and it kind of hurts to have to listen to my inner thoughts because they are alllllll over the place. They go something like this ...  Halloween decorations - maybe I should do that this year. Thanksgiving menus - what new vegetable recipes should I try out? Oh, Thanksgiving table decorations - need to strategize. And then Christmas cookies! How far ahead should I plan out my baking schedule? I need to look up recipes and make a spreadsheet. Where am I going to put the Christmas tree? Maybe I can sew some new ornaments for it. When will the pumpkin spice latte come back to Starbucks? I want to make a wreath for our front door this year. I want to make pumpkin cupcakes for Halloween. I want to design a stamp to make some new holiday tags. I think our Christmas music collection needs some updating. I should go check out CDs. It's cold enough to start crocheting again - I should make a neckwarmer, a thick one with lots of bobbles. I should find some new slow cooker recipes. We should go apple picking soon. An apple tart would be really good right now. Oh my god, why am I not eating carbs?  My inner thoughts clearly need some wrangling because I'm having a really hard time focusing with all the racket in there.

Yes, I complain incessantly about stores jumping the gun on the holidays, but mentally I'm right there with them. The first sign of cold weather and I'm off and running. Which is ridiculous considering that the forecast for Sunday is eighty. nine. degrees. We're swapping our summer and winter comforters at least once a week at this point and I wish the weather would make up its mind.

I just find fall to be such a productive time. It's cozy inside and I'm motivated to curl up and work on big projects for hours on end. Turning on the oven feels comforting instead of death inducing. The only downside is the lack of light for pictures, but it's not a bad trade off. Is anyone else feeling the urge to push forward into fall/winter? I think I'm ready. Now.

Friday flowers

Delphinium are worth buying just for the name.

{delphiniums, sink}

Luckily they are also lovely in their own right.

{delphiniums, light}

Lovely enough to convince me to share a rare vertical picture. (The obsessive side of me hates that vertical photos don't fill the entire width of the column, but I love that you can see the lip of the glass jar here - it's one of my thrifted apothecary jars.)

{delphiniums, glass}

And to keep shooting as the light crept away and dusk settled in. The days are growing shorter.

{delphiniums, dusk}

They smell good too.

Friday flowers(ish)

This might be the last of my summer basil.

{basil, glass}

I'm going to see if I can get a second crop. I've had these sprigs sitting in water for a couple weeks (I change the water every couple days) to get them to sprout.

{sprouting}

It's working! Once the roots seem developed enough I'm going to pull out the old basil plant and put these in. It might be too cold for them soon, but since all my gardening efforts are completely inept, I might as well try it.

Friday flowers

The other fun part about mixed bouquets is that everything dies off at different times and you can usually get a recycled arrangement out of it the second week.

{recycled flowers}

The snapdragons, the lisianthus and a few of the filler flowers still some life in them, so they went into a small vase. They're actually living in our entry way, but it apparently gets NO LIGHT whatsoever and I've never been able to get a photograph there. Sigh.

Friday flowers

A mixed bouquet from the flower stall.

{mixed bouquet}

I love all the different textures, even though it requires a bit more work than my usual one flower arrangements. 

{flowers}

I'm certainly not a professional, so feel free to take my advice with a grain of salt, but when I'm putting together something like this I start by pulling out the largest flowers. In this case, that was the dahlia, the lilies and the snapdragons. I put my trusty flower frog in the bottom of the vase and stick the larger flowers in securely, spreading them out more or less evenly. Then I start adding in the filler flowers, often sticking a stem in and then pulling it out to trim it a bit. It's not effortless for me, because I'm always having to correct and re-arrange, but I do love the process.

Friday flowers

Orange-y red freesia.

{freesia}

They smell amazing.

{freesia}

Friday flowers

Textured yellow flowers, from a sweet friend. Perfect for the sunny week.

{yellow}

They are sort of velvety to the touch.

{yellow + raffia}

In completely unrelated news, I have not yet gotten salmonella, despite eating many, many poached eggs over the last few months, some of which were part of the recall.

When I was little, my dad informed me that I would eventually get salmonella if I kept ordering eggs benedict every chance I got. I considered this, seriously. I decided that a lifetime of lightly cooked eggs and hollandaise sauce was worth just about anything. I'm taking my chances. But also buying more small farm eggs.