6th December, 2021

 

Hello all,

My smoke bush is positively SMOKEN! I wrote about it three posts ago when it was a bit too fragile to use. Now it is more robust, so I'm enjoying using it. I recently bought the container in the above arrangement with the smoke bush in mind. The colour really appealed to me but the small bottle neck is a bit of a problem. Fortunately, the stems of the smoke bush are quite thin and each stem can have several flowers, therefore I could easily fit the rather voluminous branch in the narrow opening. The crucifix orchids, also have thin stems and, together with their vibrant colour, made them ideal for my arrangement.

And, while I'm at it, here's another arrangement. This is one of Lucy's containers. It is made of resin and it, too, has the ideal colour for smoke bush. Interestingly, the flower on the right side is more green in colour compared to the one on the left, which is more mature, thus deeper in colour.

Last Wednesday was our final lesson for the year and, as is our tradition, the theme was a 'Celebratory Arrangement'. We were a small group and we all went with Christmas.

Vicky went with an all white theme, using glass bottles, gypsophila, disbud chrysanthemums, sprayed, dried branch and large tinsel. I feel I have to explain that this was quite a large and spectacular arrangement but the photograph does not do it justice.

Dianne had the most amazing waratah stem with the flowers growing along it like a totem. It was challenging to find an appropriate container for it. She settled on one of mine, which, because of its curved shape gave more stability for the weight of the flower stem.She also used a sprayed corky elm branch and some beads for a bit of Christmas bling.

Nicole used wisteria vine and roses with multi-coloured Christmas baubles in a ceramic, nageire container.

Shaneen started with a dull silver container and added sprayed magnolia branches, red and white roses and beads that were the exact same colour as her roses, which are called 'Hot Chocolate'.

As for me, I re-worked a previous Christmas arrangement. You may remember it from three posts ago. The mahonia was still looking very fresh and I was loathe to discard it. So, I sprayed it silver and replaced the dead flowers with oriental lilies, baubles and a battery operated light (which was very difficult to photograph), which the kids just loved.

Before

After

My student Dianne Longley is an accomplished print artist and Master Printmaker at Agave Print Studio in Trentham. She was recently awarded The Australian Bookplate Design Award - 2021 ($10,000 and medallion).

Dianne with her printing press

Te award winning bookplate

Needless to say, we are very proud of our Dianne and wish her even greater success in the future.

Whilst we're on the subject of Dianne, she, very kindly brought me two stunningly beautiful peonies. Living in Trentham, with its cooler climate, she has much greater success with peonies than me. One of the flowers did not survive the night but I was able to make a very simple arrangement with the other. 

I kid you not, it was the size of a plate

Two days later, the petals had fallen but I still couldn't throw it away. I put what was left - the centre of the flower - into a small vase and added a piece of smoke bush that was left over from other arrangements.

I leave you with these photos, which warm my heart. My husband, Sam, with our three granddaughters foraging  through the raspberry canes looking for raspberries. They each carried a little bowl of them when they came in.

Bye for now,

Emily