July 3, 2011--through the leaf epiphany

I didn't expect to have an arranging epiphany today, which is probably why I had one. I'm hosting neighborhood 4th of July celebration tomorrow, and flowers didn't need to be much, but they were on my mind. Felt totally uninspired, but decided to just keep moving plant material around all day and see what transpired (as I worked on other tasks). First thing I did was try to clean up pantry, which involved cutting back the Angel wing begonia, which grows there in a window. Took those stems and added them to vessels in the kitchen windowsill.

Then, I started sort of haphazardly arranging.  Most of the begonia leaves wound up in other arrangements, but a few remained in the windowsill. and, in the midst of all this rearranging, there was one black-eyed Susan stem I didn't know what to do with.

I'm sure the wine glass in the middle of this array seems totally inconsequential, but, in fact, it (or at least the materials in it) taught me something today. That glass still had leftover parsely and basil in it from days past, but today a begonia leaf landed there. too. And when I went looking for somewhere to put my one, leftover, black-eyed Susan stem, it seemed to want to be center stage in that wine glass on my windowsill. I sort of fiddled with it, looking for a space to lead it into between leaves, but there wasn't one, so I speared it straight through a begonia leaf!!! Why not?  I'm not sure you can see how this worked in fuzzy photo below, but it felt like a mechanical triumph. Why NOT spear a flower stem through a leaf as stalwart as a begonia leaf if you need to?

Other things I learned today were many---but I'm too tired to relay them. See July 4 arrangements on washing machine and dryer below.

The thing I learned about these arrangements had to do with trusting my instincts (and energy level) to allow myself to use only two materials (well, four if you include fasciated willow and knotweed). The primary material in my arrangements came from a shrub called leatherwood (Cyrilla racemiflora). Love it. The second is Annabelle hydrangea (just a few white blossoms). I used the knotweed just for the hollow stems, to elevate the flags. The fasciated willow is really pretty coming out of watering can to left (like water!), but you can't see it in photo. Below is that shrubby material I can't remember the name of combined with white Annabell hydrangea in windowsill.