Happy Mother's Day! This post is actually a little bit late, but I'm sure you were all like me and busy busy yesterday. I hope you had a nice Mother's Day and enjoyed being with family and friends. And I bet, there was plenty of food to be had! It was for our family for sure.
David cooked barbecue ribs supper last night along with pineapple upside-down cake for my husband and me and his mom and dad. He's a great cook in addition to being CEO of Trendy Tree.)))
And Carrie, well just let me say, she always comes through on Mother's Day. She comes through on any day as far as that goes))) But now that she has opened the City Mercantile and the Trendy Tree store...well she has solved the Mother's Day gift-giving problem.))
City Mercantile
Just recently she combined the City Mercantile and Trendy Tree store into one building and it will go by City Mercantile from now on. So, when you hear me talk or read a post about City Mercantile, it will also contain many products from Trendy Tree (the website business). The will carry ribbon, florals, decorative pieces, signs, containers, and all sorts of things that are available on the website. City Mercantile has its own website: shopcitymercantile.com There is a wedding registry, a great place for shower gifts, Coontown Pottery, Annieglass, Magnolia products (soaps, lotions, and fun stuff). Candles from Park Hill and just so much more. And let's not forget gifts for men, Father's Day is coming up soon! She has a huge selection of Duke Cannon products that make great graduation gifts for guys too.
Fresh Flowers
And did I mention fresh flowers? Well....I can do better than that! Let me show you the fresh flowers I received from City Mercantile for Mother's Day. City Mercantile can fix you up beautiful fresh flowers just like these that I received for Mother's Day. And the great thing about the flowers I received, the arrangements were in containers that I can put to use long after the flowers have faded.
Gerbera daisies and tulips, what a great combination. Subtle colors in the creamy white daisy, it looks like velvet! Light purple tulips haven't quite opened yet, so they will be good for several days. Sorry, I'm no flower expert so I don't know what the little filler flowers were.
The anemone was a new flower for me and it's so pretty! It makes such a nice contrast against the antique hydrangea.
Roses
What is Mother's Day without roses. Just one or two will work. You don't have to spend a fortune to enjoy beautiful fresh flowers. And now that Carrie has City Mercantile, I suspect the bulk of the gifts I will be receiving in the future will be flowers. And that will be great! Carrie says they only do "happy" flowers. Pretty flowers for happy occasions.
If you enjoy fresh flowers, please indulge! Life is short. The older I get, the more I realize how important it is to stop and smell the roses. Literally! Now let me say, there was a time in my life that I couldn't enjoy such beauty as a bouquet of flowers from a flower shop. All I could think about was, heck, that would have bought groceries for a week. That was a long time ago and very true at the time. Bouquets don't have to come from the flower shop to be beautiful! One rose stem from the yard (if you have them, I don't) in a vase provides enormous pleasure to me.
I'm always scrounging around in the yard (or other's people's yards) for something to put in a vase to bring in the house. Sometimes it's been nothing but a bundle of longleaf grasses. That's pretty desperate! But, it's just that element of having something fresh to look at.
Antique Hydrangea
This big bloom from an Antique Hydrangea bush is just bursting with fresh color. The petals go from light green to shades of purple. The small purple flowers just really bring out the color in the hydrangea. We do have some Limelight hydrangeas in the yard and I can't wait for them to start blooming.
If you have followed the blog, you will note that last fall I spray painted my dry hydrangea blooms with copper paint for a fall arrangement. I loved them! And they lasted through fall and underwent a second painting of red paint and then I used them for Christmas!
I have to remember this year to not let the bushes get trimmed before I harvest those last blooms and hang on to them.
Glass Pitcher
Is this glass pitcher not just a perfect Mother's Day gift! It makes a stunning container for fresh flowers, but I can't wait to use it for iced tea or lemonade! Carrie, Rachel, and the folks at City Mercantile know me too well. I love simple pieces. Clear or white pieces are my favorite. You can use them year-round and for absolutely any occasion.
Bubble Glass Pitcher - City Mercantile
Carrie has made fun of me before because of my iced tea pitcher and the way I serve some things at meals. I don't like to set containers or packages out to serve from! Even if we're having hamburgers and chips. I hate just throwing the bag on the table. Put the chips in a big pretty bowl! Now, I'm not saying do that for a Monday night meal....but having friends over, or when you're feeding the family. Make it look nice! Even if it's something you didn't prepare.
My mother always said, presentation makes food taste better, or something like that. She could bake and cook food that looked wonderful and tasted delicious. Bet your mother did too.)))
I don't make tea anymore, we buy the gallon jugs. So sometimes when we're having a family and friend gathering, I pour the tea from the plastic gallon jug into a pretty pitcher, usually a big clear one. So sue me! Some of my friends still make homemade tea, but gallon jugs is the way to go for us. We like the Walmart brand better than Milos. It's clearer and tastes more like homemade tea to us. Just sayin' it's pretty doggone handy.
Orchid
I believe this is the first orchid I've ever had! Other than maybe on a corsage eons ago. Do people still wear corsages? Carrie has had some artificial orchids in the store so when this arrangement arrived, I had to ask. Is it real? Well, it is! But honestly, some of the artificial ones you really can't tell.
We had supper at Carrie's house last night for Mother's Day and she had an arrangement on her coffee table that had about three or four orchids in it, similar to the one on my desk. And I had to ask if they were real. Course I should have known they were not, Carrie can't keep anything real inside her home. Don't tell her I said this, but she kills fresh flowers. Sometimes I've told her....just to let me go ahead and take it to my house because you know you'll let it die.
The orchid container is a piece of Coontown Pottery made right in Oxford, MS. Love the simplicity of it. Nice creamy white color with smooth ridges. It will be a great piece to use for arrangements or to serve in too. You can't imagine how many times I have touched the leaves on this orchid while sitting here at my desk. They just are so thick and unusual. I have no idea how long the blooms will last, but once they are gone, I might just have to get one of those artificial orchids and re-pot it)))
Carrie reminded me not to overwater the orchid! Remember, this comes from the child who doesn't remember to add water to vases until the flowers have drooped to the table.
Here's a little tip from Rachel on the orchids. Hide your mechanics! Moss is like makeup. You can hide a lot of flaws....or just cover up things that are not so pretty.)))
Fresh Flower Tips
Add more water to your flowers as needed, using water mixed with flower food. Only change the water if it becomes cloudy or smells. Anything other than using a clear vase makes it less noticeable that water is needed! Remember what they say, out of sight, out of mind. Don't let your water level drop. Stems continue to take up water every day.
Do not add bleach to the water. Only use professional flower food.
Clear soda is not beneficial, it does not contain the right kind of sugar.
Crystal Clear Universal Premium Flower Care Packets (from Amazon)A\ (Recommended by J Schwanke of uBloom)
I hope you had a great Mother's Day and many more to come! Thanks for visiting our blog, we appreciate it. And remember to consider fresh flowers the next time you are searching for the right gift for someone. And if you're local, drop by City Mercantile. They will fix you right up!
Happy Mother's Day! This post is actually a little bit late, but I'm sure you were all like me and busy busy yesterday. I hope you had a nice Mother's Day and enjoyed being with family and friends. And I bet, there was plenty of food to be had! It was for our family for sure.
David cooked barbecue ribs supper last night along with pineapple upside-down cake for my husband and me and his mom and dad. He's a great cook in addition to being CEO of Trendy Tree.)))
And Carrie, well just let me say, she always comes through on Mother's Day. She comes through on any day as far as that goes))) But now that she has opened the City Mercantile and the Trendy Tree store...well she has solved the Mother's Day gift-giving problem.))
Gerbera daisies and tulips, what a great combination. Subtle colors in the creamy white daisy, it looks like velvet! Light purple tulips haven't quite opened yet, so they will be good for several days. Sorry, I'm no flower expert so I don't know what the little filler flowers were.
The anemone was a new flower for me and it's so pretty! It makes such a nice contrast against the antique hydrangea.
This big bloom from an Antique Hydrangea bush is just bursting with fresh color. The petals go from light green to shades of purple. The small purple flowers just really bring out the color in the hydrangea. We do have some Limelight hydrangeas in the yard and I can't wait for them to start blooming.
If you have followed the blog, you will note that last fall I spray painted my dry hydrangea blooms with copper paint for a fall arrangement. I loved them! And they lasted through fall and underwent a second painting of red paint and then I used them for Christmas!
I have to remember this year to not let the bushes get trimmed before I harvest those last blooms and hang on to them.
Is this glass pitcher not just a perfect Mother's Day gift! It makes a stunning container for fresh flowers, but I can't wait to use it for iced tea or lemonade! Carrie, Rachel, and the folks at City Mercantile know me too well. I love simple pieces. Clear or white pieces are my favorite. You can use them year-round and for absolutely any occasion.
Bubble Glass Pitcher - City Mercantile
I believe this is the first orchid I've ever had! Other than maybe on a corsage eons ago. Do people still wear corsages? Carrie has had some artificial orchids in the store so when this arrangement arrived, I had to ask. Is it real? Well, it is! But honestly, some of the artificial ones you really can't tell.
We had supper at Carrie's house last night for Mother's Day and she had an arrangement on her coffee table that had about three or four orchids in it, similar to the one on my desk. And I had to ask if they were real. Course I should have known they were not, Carrie can't keep anything real inside her home. Don't tell her I said this, but she kills fresh flowers. Sometimes I've told her....just to let me go ahead and take it to my house because you know you'll let it die.
The orchid container is a piece of Coontown Pottery made right in Oxford, MS. Love the simplicity of it. Nice creamy white color with smooth ridges. It will be a great piece to use for arrangements or to serve in too. You can't imagine how many times I have touched the leaves on this orchid while sitting here at my desk. They just are so thick and unusual. I have no idea how long the blooms will last, but once they are gone, I might just have to get one of those artificial orchids and re-pot it)))
Carrie reminded me not to overwater the orchid! Remember, this comes from the child who doesn't remember to add water to vases until the flowers have drooped to the table.
Here's a little tip from Rachel on the orchids. Hide your mechanics! Moss is like makeup. You can hide a lot of flaws....or just cover up things that are not so pretty.)))
