One of my goals for this newsletter is to give you a look into what my life is like working as a florist. Last week was super busy and one of my designers was on vacation. I needed to bring in reinforcements. Here's a recap:
Monday
Monday is usually a day off for me and my staff, but last week I had a rare Monday wedding. One of my neighbors from
Red Emma's got married. There weren't too many deliverables, and I did most of the personal flower designing over the weekend. I also brought in Chris for a couple of hours of freelance. He designed a gorgeous arrangement entry display for the reception. It was a manageable and fun job with nothing else going on.
Tuesday
Again, Tuesdays are usually part of my “weekend,” but I never want to turn down corporate work. I had a small retirement party (six table centerpieces and two tall vases) to deliver to the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health. I also needed to design for a big event (77 centerpieces) for McCormick & Company to deliver on Wednesday morning. I have been a vendor with both JHU and McCormick for years and greatly value our relationships. I had to ask my lead designer, Jess, (also usually off on Tuesday) to put in an extra day. I convinced Irene, a previous employee, to pick up the clippers again for a few hours. I also brought in freelancer Carmen to clean and prep flowers. My husband, Eric, did the delivery. It was a full day.
Wednesday
I packed up the the McCormick delivery early with Eric. I got him out of bed with a promise of donuts at Wegmans when we were done. Jess was at the shop putting together our Wednesday subscriptions and orders. Since I had the van, Jess could not start the weekly deliveries. We also had
Flower Happy Hour so we were tight on time. When we got back from McCormick (Jess got donuts too), I sent Eric out on deliveries for the afternoon. Happy Hour was hoppin' and I was very tired when I got home at 8:00. I only made it through a few songs on American Idol. (
Iam is my favorite.)
Thursday
I had a full studio of designers again getting ready for two more events on Friday in addition to our regular Thursday subscriptions and orders. Jen Majewski squeezed in some freelance design for me after her day ended teaching high school English. Eric, again, needed to replace Jess on deliveries so I could utilizes her design skills in the shop. It was a reasonable eight hour work day.
Friday
Our work on Thursday was for two different alumni celebrations. Both ordered arrangements in their school colors. We made two dozen arrangements in yellow and white for Bryn Mawr, and another two dozen arrangements for Friends in red, burgundy and white. Delivery boy, Eric was at it again for these orders plus our Friday regulars. Stacy, one of my long time designers, spent the day designing over 80 bud vases for two weekend events, while Jess and I worked on personals for a wedding.
Saturday
As you can see, I am mostly an event florist with some individual orders and no real retail. Flower Happy Hour is fun, but my favorite LoCoFlo experience is
Saturday mornings at my shop. I'm open for walk-ins during a farmers market one block away. Last Saturday was a social respite before my afternoon wedding delivery in Fells Point. The delivery was easy sweet-peasy with Eric and we ate tacos to celebrate our (nearly) completed week.
Sunday
Sunday was the 2nd in a series of fundraising dinners for the
Farm Alliance of Baltimore. The Farm Alliance is a organization started my friend and flower supplier Maya Kosok of Hillen Homestead. She founded the organization about ten years ago to educate and support urban farmers in Baltimore. I'm a beneficiary of their mission and serve on the committee to plan these fundraisers. For this dinner, Two Boots Farm donated the flowers we designed on Friday.
What a week! This was definitely not normal, but I had so much flower fun! It's not even mother's day yet.