Flowers are such a gift! Beautiful to behold, and many with such an amazing smell.
Enter the peony. One of my all-time favorite flowers. They seem too good to be true. A low maintenance plant with gorgeous flowers. The blooms are ridiculously large, many varieties are wonderfully fragrant, and their foliage is a deep green that contrasts the flowers perfectly.
Another great thing about peony plants is that they are perennials, which means they will grow back each year. If they are planted well and like their chosen spot, they should thrive with little maintenance.
BONUS. No thorns! Another reason I prefer peonies over roses. Without thorns, they are easy to cut and hold, and not having to remove several thorns per branch saves time when creating arrangements.
When we purchased our home we were looking for a low maintenance lawn, as we knew Brian’s ALS was quickly progressing. We lucked out and found a lovely little house surrounded by mostly boxwood bushes in the beds. While boxwoods are pretty easy to keep up, they aren’t very pretty. They provide lots of pollen for the bees but I like color. I want flowers!
Slowly but surely I’ve replaced most of the boxwoods on the property. The biggest project to date has been the front bed. It sits in front of our garage and is about 12’x24′. I dug out ten boxwood bushes and replaced them with a dwarf crepe myrtle and several peony bushes. It took a couple of years for the bushes to really set themselves. They have been so worth the wait!
When spring comes, I love to get up in the morning and take a lap around the house and just look at all of the plants. It’s so fun to begin to see plants coming up out of the soil, things turning green and buds on the plants. Each morning I am astounded at the progress that some plants have made. The rate of growth is just amazing.
Peonies are no different. Each year I watch as they push up from little buds peeking out from the rocks.
Once they start showing up, they do not stop! Just a few weeks after the peony bushes begin to push up from the ground, they will become little bushes before your very eyes, and soon each bush will have a few buds on them.
The buds are cute little balls teasing you with the bloom color that is to be. Ants are attracted to peony buds, and to see them is a good thing so just leave them there.
Finally, after much anticipation, the peonies will bloom and there will be flowers to cut. My favorite part!
Since peony blooms are so large, they make for a fantastic and showy arrangement. Perfect for impressive centerpieces, flower arrangements, and bouquets.
In the past, I approached flower arranging more simplistically. For example, with peonies, I’d cut a few and put them in a vase that would hold the number of flowers I had. Or I’d rearrange a cheap bunch of whatever was on sale at the grocery store.
Over time I started to pay more attention to those floral arrangements as well as those that were delivered to the office, bouquets in movies, or on TV shows.
To me, the prettier, more impressive arrangements are those with a variety of textures. I started to walk around the yard and see if there were other flowers or greenery that might go with the flowers.
Things that had not really occurred to me before, like fern leaves, evergreen, and even flowers from weeds in the yard are all things that can really add to an arrangement.
HERE’S HOW TO GET A LOOK LIKE THIS BEAUTIFUL PEONY ARRANGEMENT
The flowers and greenery can be switched out for things other than peonies.
One key is to keep the same color scheme, keeping the greens in mind, as sometimes foliage can clash and doesn’t look quite as aesthetically pleasing.
A note about this arrangement: These peonies were cut at full bloom. GORGEOUS when first arranged but they only lasted about 24 hours at that peak aesthetic beautifulness, and about 7 days being very pretty.
In order to have the arrangement last much longer, cut the blooms just as they are starting to open up. This will give you a longer window to enjoy them, and the arrangement will move and change over a few days as the buds open up. Truly something to enjoy!
IN THIS ARRANGEMENT:
10 – peonies (8 purple, 1 coral, 1 white)
1 – Leland cypress branch
6 – Hosta leaves
10 – Fern leaves
10 – Boxwood twigs
HOW TO CREATE THE FLOWER ARRANGEMENT IN FIVE STEPS
1. Gather your supplies.
For the most basic arrangement, you will need:
a pair of scissors or garden shears
a vase or container
your favorite flowers*
water
a workspace that can preferably get wet, like a counter or outdoors
When cutting flowers it’s best to use sharp scissors or garden shears, though you can tear the flower from the stem if you must. Gasp! The cleaner the cut, the better for the flower, and the longer it will last.
*If the arrangement is for a gift, consider the recipient’s favorite flowers and scents. Some nerdy folks like myself even keep a little spreadsheet of their friends’ preferences for things like this. (I also keep up with coffee and adult beverage preferences, and the like. I said I was nerdy!)
2. Start with your vase.
Knowing the size and shape of your container is a great place to start. Whenever I receive flowers I save the vase. That way I have several to choose from and can use them for a variety of occasions. Many containers can be used for a vase, so keep your eye out. Don’t let anything go to waste! Save jars and other containers that might make for a pretty vase.
For this arrangement, I selected one of my favorite vases. This one has a great base and the shape really lends itself to such a pretty arrangement. Some containers will hold flowers standing straight up, and some open up more at the top, which allows more room for a fanning effect at the top. The more you practice, the more you’ll get a feel for how arrangements will end up looking in a vase.
3. Choose your focal points.
What flowers do you love? Which do you want to be the stars of the show?
Here, I knew I wanted peonies to be the main flowers. You could do roses or any other flower with a large bloom. Peonies are great, in that the bloom is dense and holds up well in a large arrangement. Consider colors as well. These peonies are in the purple and pink color ranges, as well as white which works well with those.
It all depends on the look you want, and what you have available to you. Do you have what you want around your house, or will you need to buy flowers and a vase first?
4. Take a walk in your yard. Or the flower aisle at your local store.
Time to gather all the pretty stuff. Be sure you’ve got your vase ready, along with an idea of how much of that pretty stuff you will need.
Walk all around your yard, checking out anything with an interesting leaf or texture to it. Along with the main flowers, snip a few branches off an evergreen tree. Cut a few leaves off that Boston fern on the porch. Don’t be afraid to try something different.
When planning what to grow in my yard, I consider cut flowers. One nice thing about having a little bit of space is that you can grow your own flowers simply to be cut for arrangements. As I type this I’m getting a waft of the peony scent from the arrangement. It’s similar to a carnation, and it is wonderful. Aromatherapy.
More like… floraromatherapy?! 😂
5. All together now!
All right, so you’ve gathered some pretty flowers and some other pretty stuff to go with it. Now it’s time to arrange it in the vase or container.
I like to start with the main flowers. Start by putting them in the vase and spread them out a little. Depending on the vase, they might want to all slide into one bunch but as you add more filler, they will begin to take their place in the arrangement.
So much of it is just trial and error. Place one thing here, then there, add a branch of this, take out the twig of that. I like to turn the vase clockwise as I work, getting a feel for where I can slide stems down into the bunch. If a branch from a stem is getting in the way or getting snagged just snip it off the bottom half of the stem. Keep working it until you love the way it looks.
Post your creations on social media and tag it @strength.of.love. I love to see people’s creativity!
BONUS TIPS:
Some flowers just don’t like to sit next to other flowers. Some flowers really do best on their own. Over time you’ll begin to see which ones like to mingle and which flowers are a bit anti-social. 🙄
Most peony and other large blooms have a fantastic aroma, but if your focal point flowers don’t have much of smell, consider adding something like peppermint or rosemary to add a natural, delicious, and even practical texture. It can even be used for cooking at some point!
