Tag: flowers

About to Bloom

I ripped out her zinnia. Technically, I didn’t do it, but it’s my fault.

I took all three kids shopping with me for new school clothes over the weekend while Brandon stayed behind to mow the lawn. “That’s a weed,” I told him as we walked by a planter, pointing to a tall, odd plant I hadn’t noticed before. He pulled it.

The first grade kids planted seeds into little plastic cups as winter turned to spring. We could see them through the window and Eleanor showed them to me, saying that they were supposed to be a surprise. (She was too excited and proud to wait.) The class had lined their cups along the windows and watched them grow, then brought them home just before Mother’s Day weekend to give as gifts. Eleanor and I watched as her seedling continued to grow, remembering (mostly) to water it — just a few drops at a time. “Not too much, mom! Here. I know how to do it.” The weather finally warmed and we planted the tiny sprout outside in a big planter where the side yard meets the back, where we would see it often. We checked on it as it grew sideways at first, then up, growing from two leaves to four, and then eight. We didn’t know what color it would be, but we put forth our best guesses. Pink, probably! At least we hoped so. It’s my favorite color.

This morning, it was Brandon who was taking all three kids out while I stayed behind to work. I helped get them ready, like always, then went out to help load them in the car. “Let’s go check on the zinnia before you go!” My idea. And when we couldn’t find it, I realized that hadn’t been a weed. I realized why I hadn’t noticed it before. It had changed. It was just about to bloom.

I know it’s not that big a deal, but we cried, me more than her. I thought that maybe I could find someone with a zinnia and transplant it, showing her when she got back. It’s not the same though, is it? It won’t have the same bend to it. It won’t be the seed that we cared for together. We’ll never know what color it would have been, but I’d like to think we were right. Pink, my favorite.

August 23, 2016
Sending the Prettiest Flowers

I love having fresh flowers in the house and sometimes I luck out at the grocery store when they have pretty ones, but it’s really hit or miss. And I’ve not been all that impressed in the past with options for delivery when I want to send flowers. I mean, can’t a girl just send a big bunch of garden roses? Not long-stemmed roses — I’m not into those. I’m talking big, fluffy pink roses with lots and lots of petals. You know, like these!

Yep, those are my kind of roses.

The Bouqs Company is sponsoring today’s post, so before sharing them (and a discount offer) with you today, I ordered a couple of Bouqs to try them out for myself. The flowers above are their “Precious” pink garden roses.

Do you know about The Bouqs Company yet? I’ve heard stories, with other flower delivery services, of people getting substitutions in their order or that everything was already wilting. Ordering from Bouqs.com means you get flowers that are cut the day you order and shipped for free the next day right from the farms, so those flowers arrive fresh and stay looking good for longer. What you see is what you get and there are no random add-ons (cheap candy, ugly vases, teddy bears… you know). And their farms are sustainable, eco-friendly, and on the side of an active volcano. Yep.

(Their video explaining it all is actually pretty funny. Science project volcanoes for the win!)

The other Bouq I ordered was a mixed arrangement: “Porcupine” pincushion protea.

Pow! Protea is another one of those flowers that can be hard to find. There’s a florist around here that sometimes sells it for like $12 a stem, so getting a huge bunch of these delivered at a good price was awesome. They have flat, affordable pricing on all of their Bouqs — you just pick the size you want. No hidden costs, no delivery charges or fees. These were some of my favorites…

• 1. Marshmallow • 2. The Flamingo • 3. Infinity • 4. Energetic • 5. Ballerina • 6. Porcupine • 7. Whimsy • 8. Showstopper • 9. Adelaide • 10. Tiger • 11. Precious • 12. Abracadabra

My mother-in-law’s birthday is in April, Mother’s Day is in May, and then my mom’s birthday is in June, so every year, it’s like a little triathlon of monthly gift-giving for moms in the Balch household. I’m glad Bouqs.com has so many styles that I’d feel really good about sending because any of them would be a perfect gift for Mother’s Day! If you want to send flowers from The Bouqs Company, you can enter the code MDAY20 to receive 20% off your order. The code is good for one week, but you can place an order now and choose your delivery date.

You can even send some to yourself if you’re so inclined. Just saying.

This post was sponsored by The Bouqs Company.

April 26, 2016
Scientific Botanical Prints

Would it really be surprising that someone as fond of pink as I am would also be fond of flowers? Even the less girly among us can appreciate a good bloom, no?

A few people, in writing about my keynote at BlogPodium, noted that I had dressed to match my blog. My branding. The truth is that I’m just consistent in what I like. My blog matches my clothes, my home… even down to some of the book on my shelves. For example, here are two of my favorites.

The Rose: An Illustrated History, and more recently, The Art of Instruction. My dog rose print is the same one featured on the latter’s cover.

I designed two themes for Making it Lovely, and if you’re on the default “Lovely” theme, you’ll see an abundance of flowers in the background. Even if you choose to view the blog in “Minimal” mode, you’ll still see my custom floral illustrations in the header. As much as I love a good, clean site with a true minimal aesthetic, it’s just not me. The flowers (and colors and patterns) I use aren’t part of a larger, calculated move on my part to reflect my branding (though it works as one), I just like them. Simple as that.

I saw that a flash shopping site was selling framed botanical prints a few weeks ago. I had enough credits to cover the cost, so I bought one. They’re no longer available on that site, but they can be found (unframed) at The Evolution Store.

I would have loved to hang two prints over the sofa (like this), but the picture rail in my living room doesn’t leave enough clearance.

These prints are huge. I love the scale of mine, but I don’t know if that corner of my living room is interesting enough to warrant art of that size. Something feels a bit off too, between the print, the plant, and the vase on the other side of the TV. I’m going to leave things as they are for a while to see if I get used to the print’s (rather commanding) presence, but I may play around with the placement. It’s beautiful though; I’m glad to have it.

June 4, 2012
Patterned Black and White Pillows (Each Under $50)

I put together a couple of guides to mixing and matching throw pillows last week. Many of you requested a few more affordable options, so I gathered a collection of great black and white patterned pillows under $50.

• stripes • floral • funny • graphic • monogram • rad

That dog pillow cracks me up! He’s so serious.

October 6, 2011
Changes in the Living Room

I had written earlier this year about how the living room had stayed fairly consistent over the last five years. I still like the room, but I had been feeling the need to shake things up a bit. So I’ve been making some changes.

I got my hipster Chia pets. (Local friends, Carriage Flower Shop here in Oak Park has them.)

I sold the orange chair (fare thee well, sweet orange chair!), and I have the floral chair floor sample that I repaired in its place. I was able to almost pay for the new chair with the old, and the chair paired with a floor lamp makes a nice reading corner.

You may recognize the pillows in the room from yesterday’s post. I should point out that August gave me that red/orange pillow for my birthday last week. Didn’t he do a great job picking it out? I suspect Brandon helped him, but good job all around.

The rocking chair is upstairs (because I am lazy sometimes and don’t like to cart it upstairs and back down for August’s monthly photo), so we brought back the other Eames chair and the elephant. It is possible that I have too much of an affinity for Eames furniture, but they’re classic investment pieces that I don’t tire of. Plus they’re sentimental for us. We got the LCW when we were married, the rocking chair when we were expecting, and the elephant for our first Christmas as new parents.

There are still some things I’d like to do in the living room. I took down the silhouette quilt above the sofa. It was funny to have that many heads in one space now that the busts are on the side tables! So we need some different art. Or a mirror? Not sure.

I’d also like to switch out the side table next to the floral chair. It’s cute, but the spindle doesn’t play well with the floor lamp behind it and something chunkier would look better. Oh, and I keep putting it off but I need to paint the trim white. I’m always too busy, but I don’t think there will be a time when I’m not busy, so I really should just force myself to tackle it.

What else? Maybe one more pillow. Maybe different curtains (maybe). Not much… the room if feeling pretty good now.

September 28, 2011
Patterned Pillows to be Mixed & Matched with Wild Abandon

Any and all of these throw pillows work together, but for the pattern shy, may I suggest choosing just two?

• stripes • polka dots • floral • texture • monogram • pow!

p.s. Too crazy? A little color-shy? Try these.

September 27, 2011