September Celebration of Succulents, continued

You might remember the fabulous wedding centerpiece I showed in the previous post, if not, here it is again.

It took a while to deconstruct this lovely arrangement, but my hope is that the extracted plants will take root in Cambridge and live happily throughout our apartment.  I didn't take any pictures of the deconstruction, but it did take long enough for someone to make cookies, someone else to make gazpacho (both from scratch), and it continued on after the lunch break. whew!

What was involved in all of this? (approximately)
1. Remove the twigs, flowers, and ivy (all the stuff that was easy to pull out)
2. Discover that some of the moss and succulents were glued together, pull them apart gently
3. Rinse out the metal tray and plastic liner, for future use
4. Delicately cut the foam adhesive away from the base of the succulents
5. Make tiny cuts at the base of the succulents, roll in rooting powder
6. Find/decide on planter pots for the re-potting process
7. Put dirt into pots, then plants into dirt (without brushing off the rooting powder)

The end result looks wonderful, I just hope they thrive!

Beauteous variety

 Can you spot the freestyle planters in the photo above? 
The adobe rectangle, the teensy pink & white bowl, and the owls!
The orange bowl and the black bowl are spare plastic cereal bowls from the apartment.

Moss, just moss

 I found the off-white ceramic bowl (above) at the DPW.  Right away I knew I wanted to start a succulents garden, I just hadn't gotten to the plant nursery- good thing I waited.  It was the perfect size for these little beauties.

Rock garden, in a groovy rectangle planter

Piling on the freestyle

Keen-eyed readers might notice that the demi-lune style table against the green wall in our living room was also a summer street find. Freestyle x2.

What a super (succulent) September this has been so far. I can't wait to see what else turns up.

The Start of Some Succulent Love

Weddings are a celebration of love and friendship, and although a small wedding favor gift-to-guests is common I don't usually think of weddings as potential sites for freestyle ingredients.  Maybe some of you have gone home with a lovely cut-flower centerpiece arrangement in the past?  Well, at the ceremony of two dear friends over this past labor day weekend I saw something new-to-me in terms of wedding floral design, a succulent themed flower scheme.  The bride had epiphytes (aka "air plants") in her hair, and all the bouquets were made out of small rosette-type succulents.

Bridal Hair Greenery!

When I was complimenting the bride on the absolute coolness of this idea, she told me to take one when I left.  So thanks to K&F for having part of their wedding transformed into a Cambridge Freestyle first!

Behold my awesomeness!

Ok, the sharp-eyed among you might note that there are a few non-succulents in the mix; e.g. calla lily, yellow orchid, ivy, some other leafy stems I can't identify, and mosses! Such beautiful mosses.  While I didn't want to deconstruct such striking centerpiece the plant-grower in me wanted to get those succulents out of the florist foam and into the dirt.  We'll get to those in the next posting....for now you'll just have to enjoy the vase arrangements that Creative Roommate put together with the pieces I couldn't replant.

A small vase to brighten up a desk.....

A lovely reminder of K & F to grace our kitchen table.

Here's to you K&F: wishing you life, love, and freestyle!

As happy as an alligator eating raw chicken?

I found a basic black 8x10 composite wood frame a while ago. It had spent a little time in a rain shower before I got to it, but there was no print or photo inside (did you know that wet photos stick to glass and are annoying to scrape off? now you do!). It floated around the apartment for a bit displaying a photograph that looked ok, but not great. I admit, not all my ideas work out perfectly at first.  But once Creative Roommate got her hands on it she made a watercolor we'll call "Alligator Feeding Time."

This hung on the kitchen wall, above the stove, with all the other animal feeding paintings until one day... 

She sold it! To a friend of another roommate who came in, liked it, and offered cash for this and another watercolor.  This was unprecedented, but super cool. I'm sorry I wasn't there to witness it, but I'm happy knowing that a freestyle frame was a part of it.  When Creative Roommate told me the story her smile was as big  as the alligator's in the picture. Buen provecho!

Suspected Stoneware

Found: White ceramic, stoneware-feel, planter. Hallmark: that big flower delivery service, made in China.
Location: Cambridge DPW shelf
Original Condition: Slightly soiled. (pun intended!)

I love stoneware, the smooth-but-not-slick feel of it, the way it looks almost soft. I'm always happy to find these kind of pieces, and even though this one wasn't marked as such, I'm calling it stoneware.
Here is a pic after this little beauty got home, had a good scrubbing, and I repotted a trio of jades to fit inside.

This freestyle find became part of mega plant giveaway #2.  I had been growing the jade cuttings for a few months, and they were very happy in my windowsill.  Now they are very happy in their pretty planter in another Cambridge apartment. Passing on the freestyle!