Flower Love!

Floral Design of the Week

In this design I used Gerber Daisys from my favorite floral shop, a lot of little button zinnias from my flower field, some wheat, curly willow, seed heads and galix leaves.

This is a more modern design. Its in aqua foam in a circular black dish.

( excuse the sheet background... it was raining out so I had to take it inside. )

Hugs & Wonderful Thoughts,

Lavender A.

Time for Tights

Time for Tights by lavenderalden featuring green tights

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Hugs & Wonderful Thoughts,

Lavender A.

Pumpkin Wine!

My pal Clayton & I got the idea of making pumpkin wine. We both have had success with Honey Mead & Hard Cider in the past so we were excited to tackle our next experiment.

We started with 8 pie pumpkins which yielded about 5 pounds of pumpkin guts. Its important to use pie pumpkins because they have more flavor than jack-o-lantern pumpkins.

We scooped out all of the guts and tediously removed all of the seeds.

Don't worry they didnt go to waste. We toasted the seeds in the oven with salt & pepper.

All of the pumpkin guts go into a 5 gallon bucket.

Then we added water, sugar, fermenting yeast, Cinnamon, Allspice, Nutmeg.

We installed a tube on the top of the lid and put some water in it so the air could escape but not enter the bucket.

It smelled just like pumpkin pie!!

We also did it the old fashion way by hallowing out a giant pumpkin putting the wine mix inside & putting the top back on the pumpkin, then we taped it down.

Everyday we give the bucket and the pumpkin a little shake just to keep the yeast moving around.

Hopefully in the near future we will have delicious pumpkin wine!!! : )

Hugs & Wonderful Thoughts,

Lavender A.

Things I Love Thursday!

- Zumba with my girlfriends!

-- Purple Nails.
--- Nuttella Stuffed French Toast.
---- Butterscotch Pumpkin Walnut Muffins
----- Funfetti Birthday Cake
------ Really awesome graffiti art in my town. Coffee!!
------- Green Mail Art.
-------- My new dremel.
--------- All my wonderful birthday presents.
---------- An amazing flower show with my AIFD Ladies.
----------- Mumford & Sons
------------ Hiding bunnies in the plants in the school greenhouses with Erica. hehehe!


Hugs & Wonderful Thoughts,

Lavender A.

AIFD Holiday Trends Show

The Cobleskill AIFD Floral Design Club went to a holiday trends show at Seagroatt & Ricarddi Wholesaler in Latham, New York. There were so many designs and tons of people so I had to fight just to get these shots. I couldnt get to them all but I did get a few of my favorites. 

Teleflora was there handing out all kinds of goodies. I was able to swipe a lime green florist knife, a flower pen & a rose thorn stripper! : )  

My favorite! I loved watching this get made.

My friend Ashley went home with this arrangement when she won it during the raffle. It weighed like 50 pounds! We got a kickout of her winning, during the show we had been joking about using the giant urn as a chip bowl or something to put halloween candy in.

I am def going to use this design with my farmers market lillies.

It was a good time had by all! I can't wait to see how all these trends play out this season.

Hugs & Wonderful Thoughts,

Lavender A.

It's My Birthday!

{ Source }

While in my mind I am celebrating my 23rd Birthday with amazing scrumdidilyumptious cakes such as these & 

getting served all day. I will settle for some funfettie cake & a trip to the bar with my college pals tonight and go out Saturday in a awesome dress Saturday night. I have been receiving "happy B day" texts & phone calls all day! It has been great. : ) 

I even got a purple tool box! 

Hugs & Wonderful Thoughts, 


Lavender A. 

Movies for Fall ; October List Series

Tim Burton's Corpse Bride

Coraline

Halloween Town

Hocus Pocus

It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown

Ghost Busters

Beetle Juice

Rugrats Halloween Celebration Episode

That 70's Show - Rocky Horror Picture Show Episode

The Good Witch

Casper

Under Wraps

Phantom of the Megaplex

These are the things I have been watching this October. I like to keep my movies festive and not so scarry. Boyfriend is always making fun of me because I don't wanna watch super scary movies like him. I dont care! I love my October movies! : }

 

Hugs & Wonderful Thoughts,

Lavender A.

Things I Love Thursday!

- Only having a two day school week due to fall break. Yayyyy!

-- Having a flower picked & waiting for me when I get out of a boring Bio Lecture.

--- Making Pumpkin Wine with my friends.

---- My Birthday is in less than 5 days now!

----- I have been getting a ton of soap done lately. I love progress. : )

------ Having a squeaky clean apartment due to good teamwork.

------- Going to the pumpkin patch & the apple orchard.

-------- Painting my nails dark purple with gold sparkle coat over the top. 

--------- Hot coco with pumpkin marshmellows. Made by the most amazing guy ; )

---------- New Hair bands in awesome colors.

----------- Making so many boombostic crafts that I can't wait to share with everyone.

Happy Thursday!



Hugs & Wonderful Thoughts,

Lavender A.

Flower Love!

Floral Design of the Week

This week to celebrate my favorite season I made a pumpkin design. Normally this type of design would be made by cutting the top of the pumpkin right off and just have the flowers come out of the top. I went another direction by cutting the pumpkin in half and designing out of the sides of the pumpkin all the way around.  

I used a few stems of fall colored mums, gold salidago, sea oats, many rose hips, green amaranth, a little purple limonium, yellow billy balls, pittosporum leaves & some curly willow.

This design is simple. Just cut the pumpkin in half. Hollow is out. Put a block of florist ( aqua foam that has been soaked ) in the bottom half of the pumpkin. Stake the top half od the pumpkin to the bottom a few inches above so there is room for the flowers. Then just work your way around the pumpkin with the flowers.

If you wanted a bit more sparkle to this design I would wrap a few pieces of gold boulion wire around the design. Not to much but just enough to make it shimmer.

This is def the perfect centerpiece for a harvest dinner party!

So stop by your local florist & pick up some fall flowers to make your design, or if you want a design like this but you dont wanna make one I'm sure your florist could make something similar they may even have them in the cooler already.

Hugs & Wonderful Thoughts,

Lavender A.

Top Soap Shops

Today is a soap day! I have been up early making soap all day so I thought since I'm getting ready soap line ready for my etsy shop I would make a list of my favorite soap shops to aspire to. : )


Anderson Soap Company

Sales: 39,480

This is one of the most popular soap shops on etsy. Is it wrong that I just wanna eat their whipped soaps? They look like frosting!

I love his quit your day job article !

Here his etsy shop

Savor Soap

Sales: 26,316

This soap shop comes out of San Francisco. Her labels are amazing. I am dying to try her crème fraiche whipped soap!

Her quit your day job Article was very inspirational for me.

She was also an etsy featured seller.

Buy her awesome soaps here!

Long Winter Farm

Sales: 13077 

She has the sweetest looking lip balms. I can’t wait to try one!

Heres her Blog

She was also a Featured seller.

Buy her soaps here

Sun Basil Garden

Sales: 12,314

The bacon & eggs soap, its so cute! This shop is run by a cool mom that makes cool soap!

Here is her featured seller article.

Her soaps are so colorful!

Here is where you can buy her soaps. : )

Lovelee Soaps

Sales: 12908

Her sock monkey popsicle soaps were featured on the Martha Stewart Show!

I love her Spotlight article.

Here is her featured seller.

Buy her soap here.

Orange Thyme

Sales: 9,359

This adorable shop sells lips balms, lip tints, lip shimmers, perfumes, soaps and lotions. I’m in love with her labels!

Here is her featured seller article.

Buy her soaps here

Naiad Soap Arts

Sales: 5,732

 This shop features a bunch of crazy patterned soaps. Her soap stamping is awesome.

Shop her soaps here !

Paintbox Soap Works

Sales: 4,163

This company has really stellar names for their shop such as “the queen is dead” & “the man in the moon”. Also the whole selling soaps like they are little squares in a paint is a great original idea. : )

Buy her soaps here 

Rocky Top Soap Shop

Sales: 2,386

Thia soap company comes out of Maine. They make cold process vegan soap bars. I love their product photos and packaging. I love a shop with uniformity. : )

                                    
                                                     They were a featured seller not to long ago.

                                                                 Buy their soaps here

Heartsandbows494

Sales: 2,213

She has awesome lip balms. What a huge variety!

Buy her soaps here!

I love all these shops! I gotta get back to making soap. 

Have a great tuesday everyone! 

Hugs & Wonderful Thoughts, 

Lavender A.  

Hoop Dance?

     

Hoop Dance!

             I got into the wonderful world of hooping about two years ago && I havent stopped hooping since!

     I came across a hoopnotica video on youtube and I was instantly mesmerized with it. I bought my first hoop off etsy & I fell in love with it. I began hooping sometimes 5 hours a day. I became obsessed ( & I still am ) with learning every trick.

So what is this hooping business I speak off??

      It is sort of like hula hooping but since Wham-O owns the rights to that title, people in the sport just refer to it as "hooping". && The hoops that are used by todays hoopers arent the toy hoops you find in the department store. These hoops are made for adults and the come in all kinds of colors an they usually range from 35 inches around to 42 inches around. The act of hoop dance is to use your hoop to dance inside of it and do all kinds of cool tricks with it. ( I even do yoga with mine!!! )

This Hooping Life is sweet! It's such a amazing subculture filled with the happiest sort of people.

    It's super addictive! Whats awesome it allows me to meditate && burn 600 calories per hour at the same time.

    Anyone can hoop if you wanna find out more there is a great hooping community called hoop city : )

There is also a really great hooping blog I follow . She is quite an awesome lady.

There are tons of great little etsy shops that make custom hoops or make your own.

    This is one fun physical activity that I def recomend. The first thing I do when I get back to my apartment after a day of classes is grab my hoop and spin the stress of the day away.

I'll put hoop video updates on Lavender Lovely as I nail down different tricks. Ohh Boy : )

Happy Friday Everyone!

Hugs & Wonderful Thoughts,

Lavender A.