My fave photo, maybe, of all of 2010.

Leslie Cunningham of Click Chicks Photography has captured my heart with this photo.......

I heard she got in trouble for doing this....so worth it!!!

A little experiment.

I've usually said a big fat NO to floral sprays and preservatives for my flowers after I have designed and made them into the beautiful floral creations you see in many of my photos.  But after reading some recent blog posts in some of my favorite florist industry blogs (UBloom & JTV), I was re-thinking this and wondering if I had been making a mistake for all these years.  I am always learning new things, ALWAYS.  I'm open to suggestions by those who have gone before me and admiring the up and coming new designers and current trends.

With that said I decided to put 4 "floral preservers" to the test.

The contenders from left to right:

Floralife Finishing Touch, Floralife Crowning Glory

Prestine and Design Master Clear Life

We did this experiment with standard daisy pom flowers.

As you can see on the pink papers it shows the product and the time that the photo was taken.  We started at noon on a Friday.

I decided to add one with no treatment at 5pm Friday. As you see below, one day later,  25 hours later on Saturday.  Here is in order of best looking and freshest day two:

1.  Clear Life

2.  No treatment

3.  Crowning Glory

4.  Prestine

5.  Finishing Touch (an industry favorite)

Another 24 hours later on Sunday at 1:00  Day 3:

In order of freshest/strongest to weakest:

1.  Clear Life

2.  Crowning Glory

3.  No treatment

4.  Pristine

5.  Finishing Touch (still an industry favorite?)

The winner!!!  Clear Life by Design Master.  It is an aerosol spray, kind of like hairspray.

I still took note on Monday (sorry no photos), at 8am and it still looked as fresh as the day I picked it.

Crowning Glory was still pretty to the eye, but a little droopy.  Pristine and Finishing touch still looked worse than the daisy with no treatment.

A classy Rancho Las Lomas Wedding.

We had so much fun with this wedding.  Amelia was a great bride to work with, she has great taste and loves color!  The setting, Rancho Las Lomas, a great South Orange County wedding venue.  The flowers, bright colors in purple, hot pink and deep red...dahlias, roses, mini calla lilies, lizianthus, mokara orchids and stock.

A special thank you to Barnet Photography for sharing these stunning photos with us.  Lorrie deBellis of OC Party Places did the planning and 24 Carrots provided the fab food.  Cake by Black Forest Bakery.

Congratulations to Amelia and John, we're so glad that we were able to spread some floral love at your wedding.