Flower Arranging Series: Setting up your space, toolbox, mechanics, vases, and vessels.
Hello, World!
Flower Arranging Series: Setting up your space, toolbox, mechanics, vases, and vessels.
Your new flower babies are in the ground, and they are growing, growing, growing.
It’s time to talk about what you are going to do with all those beautiful flowers once they start blooming. I hear ALL the time, “I’m not good at arranging flowers, how do you do it?”
Let me be honest, I am by no means a professional florist. I will not claim that. They are true artists and have a special gift for sure.
What I am going to teach you is how to make beautiful bouquets and arrangements at home for yourself, without needing to be a florist. That’s the best part about growing your own flowers. You can keep practicing and practicing without feeling bad because you grew them in your own garden.
Plus, there are times you want to give flowers to a friend, but you don’t want them to be expensive and fancy. Learning to create a nice bouquet from your flowers is a great way to do that without making them feel guilty about you buying them flowers.
All that being said, I am going to try to teach you basic flower-arranging skills in this series.
Today, we are going to start with your foundational pieces.
Let’s get right into it.
Setting up Your Space.
Your Toolbox:
A few essential tools you might want in your “toolbox”. You don’t need a literal toolbox. I use a drawer in my basement, and my shed, and it holds everything I need.
A good, sharp pair of snips.
You really want sharp snips. Dull scissors and knives just don’t work the same. They can crush the stems, shortening the vase life. I buy a pack from Amazon, and when they get dull or break, I just throw them away.
Twine or rubber bands.
These are for keeping your bouquet together. Twine looks pretty, but rubber bands are cheap and easy.
Paddle Wire:
For when we take our flowers and use them to make wreaths and other fun dried crafts. Or for your winter wreath decor.
Gloves:
If your skin is sensitive, a nice pair of tight-fitting, thin gloves works well for protecting it.
Alcohol wipes.
Use these to clean your snips. Bacteria are bad for your flowers, so always give your snips a good wipe before you use them.
Buckets:
Dollar store trash cans, 3-gallon buckets, and clean buckets. Whatever you can find that will hold your flowers before arranging them. This is where we put our flowers once harvested, but before we arrange them. More on this topic in a future blog post.
Mechanics:
Chicken Wire.
This is for those wide-mouth, awkward vases that your flowers just flop around in. It’s a great tool for balling up and putting in your vase. It allows you to feed your stems through it, helping them to stand up and stay in place
Flower Frogs.
Look for these at second-hand stores. They are little plates with spikes that sit at the bottom of your vase or vessel. It has the same effect, kinda, as using the chicken wire. It helps hold your flowers in place.
Tissue Paper or Kraft Paper.
Great way to wrap your bouquet to keep it safe before you give it away. It also makes it look really really nice.
Grapevine or wire wreath frames.
I keep these on hand at all times. You never know when you are going to get that urge to create a beautiful wreath. Watch for the grapevine ones at the second-hand store.
Vases and Vessels:
I feel like the collection of vases and vessels can get just as bad as my seed collection. Find your style. I love milk glass and old water jugs. They have so much charm and character.
Every time I go to the 2nd-hand store, I scour the vase and home decor section for something that speaks to me. Something fun and different.
Your vases can be nearly any shape that can hold water. Bowls, candy bowls, crocks, urns, medicine bottles, bud vases, and small or large glass containers.
As I said, as long as it holds water, you can use it.
Does that make you look at every container with fresh eyes? It sure does that for me.