DIY Buckets of Fresh Cut Country Flowers
DIY Buckets of Fresh Cut Country Flowers.
Today, amongst other things, we're cutting flowers for a lovely family party to be held later in the week. We're just supplying buckets of mixed flowers, cut fresh from our gardens here at Common Farm between Bruton and Wincanton in Somerset. I've had a chat with the client who rang to tell me what she plans to do with the flowers, so I've cut espeicially tall alliums, foxgloves and huge cardoon leaves for her, for a big arrangement on the hall table, and smaller goodies: sweet peas, aquilegia, buttercups and sweet william, for posies she plans on dotting down the table for the big dinner. It's great if people tell me really quite exactly what they plan to do with our flowers when we supply them for DIY as I can then imagine what they're going to be turned into, and cut accordingly.
You don't have to be an expert florist to be a DIY bucket arranger. As one client who rang yesterday said, 'Fresh cut garden flowers sort of arrange themselves. They're so stunning I can let the flowers do the work for me.' Self-deprecating I'm sure, but I do see her point.
Tips for looking after the flowers we send for your DIY arrangements:
- As soon as the flowers arrive take them out of their packaging, snip a centimetre off the stems of the flowers, and plunge them straight back into clean, fresh water.
- Give the flowers several hours to recover from the rigours of their journey - it may have been hot, they may have been thirsty.
- Then arrange them into your vases and containers.
- If stems are long and there are lots of side shoots, remember to save the side shoots and use them for smaller posies.
- Keep the water in the vases fresh and snip the stems of your flowers every day and they should last a good long time for you.
Have fun and enjoy!
PS in today's buckets, in case you're innerested, are: iris, sweet peas, wild viburnum, sweet rocket, alliums, buttercups, foxgloves, sweet william, ranunculus, cardoon leaves, aquilegia... I think that's all. Nice mix, eh? x