Floral Design Class 2 and 3 at The Wedding Pantry

I had the privilege of teaching a few floral design classes at The Wedding Pantry. In the last two classes, we went over bouquets and centerpieces. I have to say that I was lucky to have all great students on board with innate senses of design. Enjoy the pictures! A special THANK YOU to Drexelle of D Park Photography for the beautiful images!
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Floral Design Class 2 - Bouquets

Solidaster/Solidago - fun yellow filler flower


Class in action!




Eva - The Wedding Pantry owner


See what I mean? Looks like the work of a pro!


Happy little distraction and special guest.

Cutest pup ever!


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Floral Design Class 3 - Centerpieces

Softer color palette of flowers this time around.


Designers hard at work!
Each person brought their own vase to design on so that they could learn how to work with the element that would best suit their event.







Mmmmm....mercury vases....so pretty!

Guest Blogger - Jesse Baker of Ecofficiency.org - Raising funds for clean water to Haiti

If you've been keeping up with Floral Sense via Facebook and Twitter since December, you may recall my fellow Ecofficiency board members Jesse Baker and Chrissy Gray's trip to Haiti to distribute water filters. Since their return, they have recognized a larger, immediate need for the people of Port-au-Prince with an urgency to raise funds to return with more water filters. I asked Jesse to guest blog for us today. The people of Haiti need your help! Thanks for taking the time to make a difference!
Yours truly, Joanna

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During the last two weeks of December, through the nonprofit organization Ecofficiency.org, I had the opportunity to organize and lead a pilot project distributing water filters and Cholera education in a remote area of Haiti, where people were dying from Cholera (they still area), and there had been no aid response (there still has not been). My partner, Ecofficiency.org co-founder Chrissy Gray, and I were shocked and heart broken at the conditions people in Haiti are forced to live in. We’ve all seen footage and read reports about the devastation stemming from the Earthquake that hit over a year ago, but once you visit, it takes on an entirely different meaning…especially when you come face to face with a disease that has such a profound and deadly impact on such a large scale. As of Feb 18, 4,549 people have died from Cholera, with that toll continuing to rise - especially in rural areas.

One of the most impacting things we learned is that nearly all aid projects in Haiti are focused in cities, particularly Port-au-Prince. This makes sense to a regarding the rebuilding efforts, as most of the buildings that were destroyed are in cities. The Cholera outbreak, however, is ALL OVER Haiti – except in Port-au-Prince. We carried out our mission in a mountainous area close to the border of the Dominican Republic called Pays Pourri, where nearly 100 people had already died. People there didn’t even know what a bacteria is, let alone Cholera.

Through contacts I have at the UN, I was told that our project was worthy and well thought out, but that they simply were not doing work in that area, nor did they have any plans to in the near future…nevermind that the UN was the likely cause of the outbreak to begin with.

Those who live in Pays Pourri are truly forgotten people in a forgotten land.

Our mission was organized, funded, and carried out at the grassroots level in Orange County; we were truly one community helping another community. Through friends, family, and our growing network, we offered an opportunity to sponsor a water filter, or donate to our general mission fund. We raised enough funding to bring 20 highly mobile and effective filtration systems, which will provide clean water for up to 2000 people for the next 4-5 years!


While we are proud of this accomplishment, the reality is that there are another 15,000 people in Pays Pourri (as well as millions more throughout Haiti) who are in desperate need of these filtration systems, and the education we were able to provide. We were literally begged to come back with more water filters as soon as possible. Our goal is to return as soon as possible in order to meet this need. For more information about our project, and to see how you can help us help people in need, please visit our Project Haiti website.

Ecofficiency.org Founder - Jesse Baker
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Pop - The Bridal Event at The Americana at Brand on Sunday February 20, 2011

If you are a bride looking for a HAWT bridal event to check out, POP is where you want to be this coming Sunday at The Americana at Brand in Glendale, CA! There is an great list of vendors lined up for the day including a bridal fashion show you won't want to miss!



For more information, check out the website! Tickets are $25 for a general pass and $65 for a VIP.

Be sure to keep an eye out for De-lovely Events' table and chat it up with amazing event planner, Candice! And you better believe that there will be some awesome floral design work from Floral Sense!

Detail Photos of Team Sparkilicious' Table for the Utterly Engaged Snap Crackel Pop! New Year Party

Check out the yummy details to our table scape for Utterly Engaged Design Challenge! We are still so thrilled and honored to be chosen as editor's pick in their Issue #14. Thank you! There are so many great details I don't know where to begin so I'll let the pictures do most of the talking. I love that Linda (Grand Soirees) and Desiree (Good Gracious) were bold enough to mix silver and gold!


Those white poppies are actually handmade by me with paper.


And this decorative contraption? We hid a confetti cannon in here!


And Lindsey's (A Wish and A Whisk) cake is AMAZING! She never fails in delivering something exquisite.


Therese from Whimisical Designs made these 3-D pop-up menus.
And Katrina calligraphy'd names on each of the diamond place settings.



I love the design cohesive detail of the tealight holders and the cannon box with similar textured silver.


Here's the confetti cannon in action on a rather artistic level.


With the aftermath of confetti everywhere!


Even the martini drinks had pop rocks thrown in them to give a little audible Snap, Crackle, Pop!

Hope you enjoyed our modern take on SNAP, CRACKLE, POP New Year Table!

Utterly Engaged New Year Party - Snap, Crackle, Pop! at Hotel Avia in Long Beach, CA

So I have been dying to post the pictures to this amazing event! And now that the Utterly Engaged Issue #14 is officially out, I can finally share all the details! Just to fill you in: On January 19, Utterly Engaged hosted a table design challenge at the gorgeous Avia Hotel in Long Beach. I was lucky enough to be asked by Linda Ly of Grand Soirees to be a part of her team. She gave me a quick run-down of the design concept which was TO-DIE-FOR. Long story short, I said YES on the spot! There were 9 teams total. Ooh, I just can't wait until the end of the post....our Team Sparkilicious was chosen as Editor's Pick of the design challenge by Editor Henny Vallee!!!!

Check page 31 of Utterly Engaged's Issue #14 here!


Enjoy the photo tour compliments of Drexelle from D. Park Photography. And congrats Drexelle! It looks like some of your amazing images made it into the Utterly Engaged Issue #14!




I loved this wall! All the guests were encouraged to write a note to themselves. And in 1 year, we would each be sent our own note.



There were two awards for the night. One would be chosen by the panel of judges and the other by guest votes.


Here's a snap of my stellar team: Linda of Grand Soirees, Desiree of Good Gracious, Linsdey of A Wish and a Whisk, Therese of Whimsical Designs and Katrina of Calligraphy Katrina (not pictured).


Check out the fab editors of Utterly Engaged: Henny and Lucia!


Drexelle pulled these mini inspiration boards together with her photos.

Here's the one of our awesome table: Team Sparkilicious! So honored and excited to be chosen as Editor's Pick!


Judges Choice!


People's Choice!


Thank you Utterly Engaged for a wonderful evening!
And a special thanks to Drexelle of D Park Photography for the gorgeous images!

I'll post details of our table in a separate post soon.
Cheers!

Floral Design Class 1 at The Wedding Pantry

Last Tuesday marked the first of a series of three floral design classes that I am teaching at The Wedding Pantry this month. I can honestly say that it was so much more fun than I had anticipated. Put me in a room with Eva, owner to The Wedding Pantry, and that's enough of a party right there. Add a few more fun ladies and flowers to the mix, its tempting to not throw confetti.



Of course, I had to bring in a few essentials including floral tools and ribbon.


I love this stuff....food for the flower soul. Toss some of this in their water and your flowers will be happy longer.


And what's a flower class without flowers. Any guesses to the names of these?


Oh yeah, that's definitely an essential for me. Don't judge.


I kept the colors bright for this class since Spring came so early.



Check out the newly established pros and their stellar handiwork! Those were just the boutonnieres too!





Thank you D Park Photography for the beautiful shots!

I'll be teaching on bouquets tomorrow night and centerpieces next week.
Feel free to sign up here. You know I would love to see you there!

Does 'eco-friendly' necessarily mean 'cheaper'?

I've been having to address this issue quite frequently lately so I have decided to tackle this issue in our blog.

Generally speaking, people assume that if something is 'eco-friendly', it means that the cost to purchase is cheaper. And with regards to some things, it does. But, for the most part, the answer is a big, fat "NO". I know, its ironic that it costs more money to make steps towards a sustainable future...at least, this will be true until the demand for sustainable products is higher.

And you're probably disagreeing with me right now by naming off a dozen ways it can be cheaper.

For example:
'Cheaper ways to be eco-friendly':
1) Re-use plastic bags
2) Walk or ride a bike for transportation
3) Recycle bottles and cans
etc, etc...

Yet, what choices are we making as consumers when we purchase new items?

Remember the movie Vanishing of the Bees that I talked about in my last post? The film-makers exposed an interesting new trend with honey. Barrels and barrels of fake-honey are shipped from China at 18 cents a gallon leaving it impossible for US commercial beekeepers to compete. Disturbingly, this honey from China is altered with milk and man-made syrups. So no wonder they can afford to sell "honey" to America at 18 cents a gallon! And yet large American corporations purchase this honey since it is so cost effective to use in their food products....which we eat.

So....would you rather pay a little more to consume real honey made from real bees? Or would you rather pay 18 cents a gallon to consume fake honey? The answer seems pretty obvious to me.

Although the upfront lower costs might immediately gratify our pocketbooks, we pay dearly for these cheap products on the back end. And the consequences are killing us.

What are your thoughts?