day three: Little Flower School

Nicolette and Sarah.

 We had an early morning jaunt to the markets on the Monday after the Wedding Symposium weekend with Nicolette and Sarah. We sought out such lovely flowers, beautiful deep pink garden roses, lilies, gorgeous daliahs, incredible dancing lady/oncidium orchids-colours I'd never seen before-a luscious black and a pretty pale cream.

pretty arrangement

The class began with an introduction to all the flowers. Something that delighted me was when Sarah and Nicolette described their wild excitement at discovering the green and faun tinged copper foliage you can see being used in the arrangement above. Nicolette said she spied it from afar and knew she needed it, the man who grew it was quite charmingly bemused and said it wasn't really worth cutting, that it was a sucker meaning it was a rebel branch growing from the rootstock.

 We did a clever chicken-wire-in-a-low-bowl for arranging. I set myself the challenge of choosing blooms I was not immediately drawn to, namely: anything too bright.

a dark version

white wall background

 I do love bright flowers but when I am making arrangements for myself I will always head for pale and pretty with something to offset it like crocea/spiny thorny twigs etc. I was pretty tired by the end of the day as I also went to work in betwix the market foray and the class but I was reasonably happy with the end result. 

My show and tell present to the girls.

 I found this on a morning walk with my dog. I've seen it for sale at the markets before. I can't recall it's name I think it starts with 'h'. I brought it in as I suspect it's a native and thought the girls might like to see it. They loved it and wanted to take it home, alas that was not possible.

upside down peach cake

to help with the long days

flowers {always}: wedding bouquets

The second day at Little Flower School began with a thorough discussion of the many details involved in putting together a beautiful wedding. I have assisted on many weddings and have been lucky enough to do all the pretty things like making bouquets, church arrangements, table centers, button holes, hair circlets but it was good to go through the other details. It was however, quite distracting as we were also surrounded by the most beautiful of blooms.

I was taught to spiral all hand held bouquets so Sarah and Nicolette's method of non spiraling was fun to play with. I suppose spiraling makes the bouquet quite tight and neat but makes it impossible to get that lovely light airy feeling in your work.

I chose to work in tones of peach, silvery sage, creams and browns. I began with the beautiful peach-blush and green quince which had a few lovely little branches coming off them. 
I was drawn-as ever-to the most beautiful fragile peach garden roses. They smelt sweet and slightly fruity like apricots with just a little hint of lemon. You can see the quince just to the right of center and another piece branching out to the left. I love stephanotis and had only used it in button holes previously so was very happy to use it here. Flannel flowers are a favourite of mine, they are so luminous, I feel like they must grow by moonlight instead of by the sun. A few sprigs of jasmine and a little dried clethora put the final touches on this bouquet. It made me feel a little like getting married.

We bound just a little of the stems which what I prefer too, leaving a more natural look than the constricted look of a fully bound stem. The girls said they often leave long ribbons on their work which is something I hadn't thought to do previously-I loved it! Walking around in a lilting breeze with these flowers would be so pretty!

Everyone who took the class made such delicately wrought, gorgeous arrangements. I took mine home to watch it slowly, and beautifully, fade. I couldn't help myself, I kept a few little pieces.

rose and fruit bearing adventures

I spent a little bit of time researching the roses I mentioned in my previous post and was momentarily attracted to the idea of purchasing bare root roses, which would make me feel like I'd been patient and that they were more mine alas alas, I couldn't wait until May 2013 which is when they are best planted. Instead we set off for Galston, North-West of Sydney. It's a very prettily settled rural area, we used to have horses there for a few years. The nursery we went to is called Green E Plants Rose Nursery. The owners were really knowledgeable and pleasantly peculiar which made it an even better experience. We bought 8 small potted specimens.

On the way home we spotted some side-of-the-road fruit, which is the very best kind of fruit. They were selling local nectarines, peaches and strawberries. Such warm bright colours and strong sweet fragrances, I couldn't resist buying far too many. We had extended family staying though so I justified my over-buying by pushing the precious fruit onto them in fresh, poached, barbecued and baked form.

When we were in Morocco in 2012, we came across locals cooking sardines in a Shwia {I'm not entirely certain how it is supposed to be spelt-I looked it up but can't seem to figure it out} over coals on the street. Basically, a Shwia is a hand held wire barbecue rack. We wandered around and bought two and have since cooked pilchards, prawns, sardines and peaches on them. They are really great to cook with because sometimes barbecues scare me a bit as I think I'll over cook everything. With this Shwia device, you can bring the delicious thing you are cooking as close to the coals/flames as you like and take it off very quickly-reassuring everyone involved that the thing won't get crisped.

silvery fish

I cooked the 'road-fruit with some thyme and rosemary on cooling coals for about an hour-checking them pretty oft. They were amazing, such a lovely rich flavour. We ate them with ricotta. The smell of them is incredibly enticing.

summery delights

 I also made an upside down peach cake which I was happy with. The peaches kept it quite moist so it was almost a pudding but the crumb was quite light somehow too. I'll post the recipe soon.