7th June, 2021

 

Hello all,

So, we're still in lockdown, it's cold and windy and I had an almighty scare, healthwise today. I had my Astrazeneca vaccine last week and yesterday I discovered a bruise and lump on my thigh. Went to the GP, who, like me, thought it was a blood clot but, fortunately, an ultrasound proved that it was not. Phew!!

Ordinarily, when I'm feeling low, the best thing I can do is to go out into the garden. In no time at all I find things to do and materials to use in ikebana and I perk up. This last week I found it difficult to be inspired and I had to put more effort in creating works for this blog.

Flowers are scarce in my garden this time of year. The arum lilies are just starting to flower, as are the camellias but there's little else. However, we, ikebanists, can create arrangements with or without flowers. For the arrangement, above, I used one large strelitzia reginae leaf and three proteas from my son's neighbours' garden. With permission, of course. I placed my self-made, ceramic container on its side, something that had not occurred to me to do until Christopher had used it that way in one of my classes.

I had one protea flower left over, so I used it in this very simple arrangement with a monstera deliciosa leaf.

Berries are in plentiful supply at the moment, so I took advantage of them to create a number of arrangements. In the wall arrangement, below, the stems of cotoneaster berries, from which I painstakingly removed the leaves, drape over the front loop and cascade forward. Unfortunately, this is not very clear in the photo.

In the next piece, I used one stem of orange berries (Cotoneaster franchetii) and dietes leaves.

And, from the offcuts, I found two stems with a right angle bend that sat together very well. I had to coax the camellia stem to follow the same line. Fortunately, camellia stems are bendable. making this quite easy.

One of the more onerous jobs in my garden is the removal of elm suckers. It's an ongoing battle because any that are not removed can, potentially, grow into full sized trees. I removed quite a lot of them on the weekend but was loath to throw away the the long, slender stems, I brought them inside and challenged myself to find a way to use them. I wanted to feature the lines created by the stems in this ceramic container with three openings. I had half coming out from the back and the other half from the front and had them meeting together in a loose weave. I finished it off with a stem of cotoneaster berries.

Front view

Back view

Once I finished it, however, I wasn't happy. I didn't feel the berries were quite right so I went out looking for something else. I found the arum lily buds and replaced the berries with them. I think it's much smarter now.

I hope you all stay safe and warm and positive.

Bye for now,

Emily