Arranging & Transporting

Saturday morning the tulips had perked up! Here they are ready for transport.

This is Part III of Extra-ordinary Day.

Centerpieces
The French tulips went into the prepared centerpieces easily, but were very droopy on Friday despite the sugar and drops of bleach I had added to the water. To my relief on Saturday morning they had perked up!  I added more camellia, clematis and some acacia greens for a grey accent.  After a good misting with water I loaded them into cardboard boxes for transporting.
Large Arrangments
Before this event, I had little experience arranging lilies and irises.  Their tall, strong stems were a welcome contrast after arranging 170+ floppy tulips!  I decided to go with two very large arrangments:  one for the entrance table and one for the central hors d'oeuvres table.  The idea was to make a big statement and pull visual focus away from the less attractive features of the parish gymnasium.
The irises weren't all open but a few hours in the sunshine opened up their blooms.

This is the hors d'oeuvres table arrangement in-process.  I stuffed magnolia inside the vase to serve as a natural oasis and a lot of heather in the center with a collar of magnolia leaves to "stop up the drain" as Michael Gaffney says.  Then I began adding the lilies.  Next were the yellow irises and lastly some apple tree blossoms for height, and eucalyptus to the collar.
This arrangement ended up being around three feet tall, minus the apple branches, and weighed a ton.  Fortunately it fit nicely inside a paint bucket for easy transport.
Medium Arrangements
With the leftover lilies and irises I made six medium arrangements.  These were to be used on the bar, the coffee/punch table, the dessert table, etc.  Toward the end I had a lot of purple irises and rather than head back out to the garden to cut more greens I went with a minimalist design for this tall cylinder vase.

Transportation

Our church is only seven miles away so I made two trips.  I put arrangements in cardboard boxes, small and large buckets and wedged them into my minivan.  A dear friend helped, as it was a lot of flowers and some of them had the tendency to tip despite my efforts to stabilize them.  We completed the task before the evening sun set and I went home to set my clock ahead for Daylight Savings and my alarm for 6am. 

To see the final product- the flowers at the First Solemn Mass reception- click here!