BOOK REVIEW: The Flower Workshop by Ariella Chezar

Beautiful flower arrangements always fascinate me. I have never learned how to create something more than a simple bouquet, but I am absolutely determined to learn. Ariella Chezar seems to be just the right person to learn from as she is a world renown floral designer. Her book “The Flower Workshop”  hits the shelves on March 1, 2016.  And it seems to be all that any aspiring or experienced floral designer needs.

The book opens with basics – how to put an arrangement together, choose a color, and, most importantly where and when to get the flowers. Basic tools and techniques follow. Next section is dedicated to tonal arrangements and everything is just so pretty!  Favorite flowers section covers the flowers one almost always considers for a bouquet. Branch arrangements (my favorite) chapter follows. Fruit and berries, compote and handheld bouquets follow. The book closes with chapter on celebrating with flowers. Really Ariella Chezar takes care of pretty much every occasion in her book. Each arrangement includes a full “recipe, which flowers and how many, what kind of vase. The photography is absolutely delightful. It’s impossible to go wrong. There are so many beautiful compositions to try out and even if some look intimidating, Chezar’s gentle guidance makes it look also very much possible to create for someone who isn’t an actual florist.

Overall impression: Gorgeous book, the photography is absolutely stunning. The author provides gentle yet straightforward instructions on how to choose, care and arrange flowers. Pretty much every occasion is covered. Excellent book. 5 stars.

 

I received this book from Blogging for Books in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

Thursday delights: Something that I love

This time it’s all about the growing things:

this iris took my breath away with its beauty

light and shadow on waterlillies

lavender love

and glorious moss!

Last week’s inspirations are here

Something that I love

I will try and post some things that delight me every Thursday from now on 🙂

clouds that are raising like mountains in the evening sky

tiny seeds trying very hard

flowers that are almost ready to open

and a friendly face in my flower pot 🙂

October in pictures

October just flew by. Why does time rushes like an express train these days? It seems  that the biggest challenge for me is to slow it down, and still I fail somehow. I did not have time to blog, but we did have time for some nice outings, nowhere terribly new and yet, because of the season and its colors, these places felt truly magical.

Hudson Gardens

I love weekdays there, the garden is empty save for a few moms with very small children and elderly people. We love to bring our sketchbooks and this time around we just took our time admiring splashes of orange and red everywhere.

splashes of red

Staunton State Park treasure hunt

Last week we did a little hike in Staunton State Park, this week the answer to the question “Where should we head?” seemed obvious- to Staunton Again, to explore a different trail. What a great hike we had! Hiking listening to the creek running along the trail, finding treasures in the grass, getting caught in the thunderstorm, and running back soaked and giggling, seeing a snake crossing our path all wet and glistening from the rain-wonderful adventure.

starting

6 months later

I can’t believe how long I’ve been away from this blog, our activities kept us so incredibly busy that seasons turned and we barely noticed. But school year is almost over and spring is half passed.

We went flower watching with C., the trees are so pretty

the wind is strong and there are many petals underfoot already

I hope they last just a little bit longer…

Monday and Tuesday

Our school started Monday. Kids did pretty well for the first day, regarding the fact that they had almost the whole August off aside from reading and some writing when they felt like it.

We started a new journal for D., he likes writing a lot, so this year instead of having just one notebook for all his writing, he got his special personal journal (“like the one mommy has, yay!” (C)) . I found a wonderful idea to get him to write more about personal stuff, it’s called “Awe-journal” and while I don’t exactly expect him to write all of his “awe” moments every time, I think it will serve as a good inspiration. We decided to make this plain composition book more personal by decorating it.  There’s an excellent idea of how to personalize composition books with duct tape sheets and metallic markers at Art Projects for kids,  we went with white contact paper this time. I thought D. would make it more colorful, but he opted out for softer colors. “Astronaut landed and can’t tell the difference between pencil and his rocket” is the theme, should I expect great things from him regarding this project? 🙂 We’ll see.