- If you’re using flowers from your garden, go out early in the morning to pick them. They’ll last longer and be happier.
- Always remove leaves/greenery that will be below the water line. If you don’t, it will turn to slime. Quickly. Your bouquet will smell — but not the way you want it to!
- Get to know your flower types. Ask your florist lots of questions. For example, the dutch iris pictured above are beautiful, but I know from experience they will look good for three days — tops. Maybe only two. If it’s Wednesday morning and I’m buying for a weekend dinner party, I’m not going to be buying any dutch iris.
- Once you know how long your can expect various flowers to thrive, you can create bouquets of flowers with similar longevity. If you don’t, you’re going to be spending time every day separating out the still-good blossoms from the ones that have said goodbye.
- Remove the flowers from the base each day. Give them a good rinse to rinse off any yucky stuff and change the water in the vase. There’s nothing worse than a beautiful bunch of flowers sitting in dirty-looking water.
- When you get home from the florist, snip an inch from the bottom of the flowers you purchased before placing into water. That gives them a fresh opening with which to suck up moisture. Each day when you change out the water, snip the ends a bit.
- When you have lilies, you must take precautions! Those cute little alien-looking things that seem so cute when the lily opens? Those are the stamens. The thin stem of the stamen is the filament and the oval-shaped thing at the end is the anther. I learned the hard way (at my wedding, no less!) that the anther is covered in a million little specks of pollen that fall off if the flower is touched and will stain whatever the pollen falls on. It’s very difficult to get off your hands, your clothing, etc.
- Use a rubber band or twist tie to bind your flowers together if you want a nice, tight arrangement.
- Accept the fact that some things just aren’t cut out to be used in floral arrangements. The passion flower (like the one pictured on the main flowers page) closes after less than 24 hours, so it’s no fun. Neither are day lilies. And things like butterfly weed and larkspur just litter all over your table as their little parts fall off.
- On the other hand, you don’t have to solely use flowers in your arrangement. Greenery of various types (go for what looks good to you) and even herbs make great extenders, so you get a bigger bouquet out of a few flowers.
- If your stems are ugly, use an opaque vase or put some beeds or baubles in with them.
- Don’t ever mix tulips and daffodils in the same arrangement unless you have had the daffodils sitting in a different vase for at least a day first, then have rinsed them. The daffodils put out some kind of chemical that will cause your tulips to die a premature death.
- Get some curly willow branches to add to floral arrangements of pots of orchids. It’s amazing how they take it up a notch.
- Small votive candle holders make lovely vases to put at each place setting.
- You can turn vegetables and fruits into vases, too. Make an opening, place a little vase or votive candle holder inside, add water and flowers. In the summer, when we have a million more bell peppers of all different colors than we could possibly use, I’ll once again be turning some into little flower holders. Can’t wait! You can also use eggplants, pumpkins, cabbages. Use your imagination!
- I’ve been told that adding a spoon full of sugar to the water will make the flowers last longer. I usually have plenty of packets of florist food, so I haven’t tried it, but that’s a better use for sugar than eating it.
- Some flowers, such as gladiolus and alstroemeria lilies, are very sensitive to fluoride in water. We keep jugs of water around that we allow to stand at room temperature for a few days before using to get rid of some of the chemicals. Using rainwater is an even better option.
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