Sunday, June 28, 2015



if you're one of my peeps, fans or faithful blog followers
 you've probably noticed a lot of activity on my website, face book page and blog. you 
probably think all i do is sit in front of my computer all day.

well i'm not going to lie, it is!!!   haha
with my daughters wedding, 2 client photo shoots and a
destination wedding in the last month, my seat has been on a seat
more than usual,
but for the record, i've also squeezed in weeding and
garden maintenance, some junking, the never ending job of vacuuming up dog hair
  and last week a really fun evening on lake minnetonka with my book club.



-----------------------------------------------

joyce and mary co-hosted our june book club on lake minnetonka. and
it was such a relaxing evening. at the marina, adorable kitty cat gypsy greeted us.
the workers said they don't even know who she belongs to,
but that she shows up at the same time every evening.
*aren't calico cats the cutest?












a couple dudes assisted us and carried all the loot to the pontoon.



the crew got settled. just wish sue (on the right) wasn't always so tense. : )



the temperature was perfect. there wasn't a bug in sight... great food, a sailboat
regatta all around us and then an amazing
sunset.  umm hmm, good times.







joyce was our skipper. 









the hostesses brought a lot of good beverages.
but when you drink beverages ya need a bathroom.
well luckily this boat had it all, including a portable stall
that cracked me up! i didn't want to be the first one to use it,
but once sue tried it out  i jumped to be next in line.



*disclaimer: no photos were taken during the actual use of this facility.
















i don't think the people on these yachts had anything on us... just say'n


we all loved skirting the lake shore and admiring the beautiful homes. these 
boathouses were particular favorites.


a last look at the crew (minus jill). 



summers are just not long enough here in minnesota and i can't believe
what a fabulous one we're having. mosquito control must have blasted chanhassen with
a LARGE chemical bomb because even the bugs have been no big deal!
 i watch too much tv in the winter but
haven't turned it on in the evening, for weeks. each night i stay 
outside till it's dark, reading and soaking in every last speck of daylight~
these days are priceless and i'm feeling blessed.

got big plans for the 4th of july? 
we'll be at the lodge and i can't wait to see what
came up in the garden i planted a month ago!


xo, beth

Tuesday, June 16, 2015

part 2 of the wedding



today i'm going to share some of the behind the scenes fun of designing the flowers for the wedding.


i knew it was going to be a lot of work for me as the mother of the bride,
but i couldn't imagine having it any other way~
*remember i did the flowers for my own wedding...and i knew if i could 
pull that off, this should be do~able too.


wedding week:

mon: i told my two sons that if they didn't get the garage cleaned up and all the
sawdust outta there from the present they were making for their sister,
there were going to be consequences.

tues: i lined up the buckets i would use for all the flowers and washed them.
it's really important to always start with clean containers for
flowers, it will extend their life.



 wed:  friend mary went with me to the floral wholesaler to
pick up everything i'd ordered weeks ago. this ended up being kind of 
stressful, because when we walked in and saw my things on a big cart,
 there were a bunch that were the wrong color, or not
what i'd pictured, so with mary's calm help, we went in and out of the cooler 
about a dozen times putting stuff back and searching for better alternatives.
mission accomplished, we headed back to my garage/design studio to begin 
the process of cleaning off foliage, de-thorning all the roses, recutting every
stem and submerging the dozens and dozens of hydrangeas and stock
in a water bath to rehydrate them. 




















originally i wasn't going to start designing till thursday, but because i was 
so excited to get my hands on the flowers and also because i was afraid
i'd run out of time, i did 5 of the 6 bridesmaids that night and also a few
of the centerpieces. whew- i know i slept better because i'd gotten started.
*this is a bridesmaids bouquet starting to come together.





these gorgeous anemones are from mary and her hubbies gardens.
i kind of hinted/asked/begged for some of them for the wedding and they graciously let me 
pick about 100 to use. they ended up being some of my very favorite of all 
the gorgeous flowers we had to use. : )   






bridesmaids bouquet







we put bleeding hearts from my garden in the two centerpieces for the 
parents tables. my sis and her hubs were at our table and it
was their 35th wedding anniversary too. bleeding hearts are her favorite.



in all the commotion i forgot to take photos of the corsages, but did snap
a quick pic of a few of the bouts all bagged up and ready to go.



thursday:
friend cheri came to my rescue and helped me all day...she was a rockstar
putting together most of the 28 centerpieces for the tables.
i couldn't have pulled off the flowers without her help...
this was just the beginning of all she did for us too.


mary and i~






i made two of these as a last minute add on. i saw the wooden boxes
at the wholesaler and knew they'd be great somewhere~



my bride girl came over after work to help decide what we were going to use in
her bouquet. it was one of my favorite parts of her whole wedding experience.
i reminded her what all we'd talked about using for her, and showed her what i'd
set aside and then she picked out each of the flowers i used for this bouquet she and
i had been dreaming of.   she loves flowers as much as her mama. : )


her bouquet had garden roses, peonys, astilbe, snowberries, clematis,
ranunculus, hydrangeas, oregano, honeysuckle, stock, lisianthus, anemones,
pittisporum and eucalyptus in it!

*i know, right? that sounds like a LOT, but it really was pretty. when i thought
i was done i asked her and she asked if i'd make it just a little bigger~
i did and she was right...  
it was done, she thought it was perfect and we both loved it.













fri.: more amazing help flooded in from the west!!!
this is my auntie dar... (or grama dar as my kids lovingly refer to her).
she is a former florist herself and she brought my cousin, "baby al", and they
worked like busy bees, tying ribbons around all the favors for our guests.
then they helped pack up all the flowers, load all the vehicles and 
get everything to the wedding site.
they also helped set up all day on saturday... sooo thankful for their amazing help!



then seester dawn and her girls fiiiiiinally showed up.
sheesh! they thought the wedding was in texas or something and headed there
before getting their bearings straight and heading north again where
most of the work was already done, but it was nice to have them to come to visit...

hahahahaha   just kidding, but it is a good story. a story that involved
a 7 hour roadtrip to get to chanhassen, when we live about 2.5 hours from each other.
i think they did it on purpose so dar and al had to do all the tedious work.
*we're on to you girls...



o.k., guess what? i decided i would forge ahead and
include the grooms dinner too...so if you need to get back to the
rest of your life, b~bye.

____________________________________________________________

the kids hosted their own rehearsal dinner at "the 
bunk house" on the horse and hunt club grounds.

************
the evening began with the wedding rehearsal.





friend karissa~



here is "dunny".








friend rose and a brother.


jess



these two little skippers were the adorable ringbearers~ jax and henry.
they didn't know each other, but like little kids often do, they became
friends in about 10 minutes.
: )







here's dad, practicing the graceful aisle walk with his girl and our
fabulouso wedding coordinator cheri.
*girlfriend took off her floral apron and put on her dress
pants to be in charge of pretty much everything on fri. night and sat.
~i have promised to give her a kidney should she ever need one.
no questions asked... she worked so hard and pretty much put everything i
had planned into action. she had a great crew of helpers on saturday
including my sis, friends mark, cindy and mary, aunt dar and little al, but she
literally took my lists of notes and a stack full of totes,
and with some awesome help, turned that reception hall into the
party of my dreams.


kenzie was part of the evening...and she was such a good dog.




now, rehearsal done, it was back over to the bunkhouse for a 
fiesta taco bar with all the trimmings!!!!






(the fan halo was an accident)



a bunch of family (and the bride) made yummy bars and cookies for dessert.
*aunt dawn surprised the kids with animal, cutout molasses cookies too.



brent graciously brought his golf cart and boy did it come in handy
to haul people from point a. to point b.

jax and "uncle fish" got busy unloading it.



grama dar finally getting to rest. (and me)






 
(these two  love each other. it's pretty cute)



these 3 boys used to live together.
brent is married to matty and they are jax's parents with another little
bambino on the way. thaine is engaged, so he's next to walk down the aisle.



my three chickadees right after the brothers gave c and a their wedding gift.
it was that darn  wonderful bag toss game that the guys worked on
for a month straight in our garage....messin with my peace because it was so messy.
it was a BIG hit!










*these next two shots are of the boards being made...the brothers worked so hard
to make this bag toss game very customized and fabulous...but brought it
right down to the wire in my work space. see that counter behind them?
yeah- that is my floral bench. one day before the flowers arrived. umm hmm.
there was thick sawdust on every surface. 





the game got broken in~





"little" nephew seth, who was a very grown-up acting usher and
a great wedding weekend helper.





 this picture cracks me up... it's matty (who's pg)  with a look of surprise, as
kenzie came barreling towards her. she verved off at the last minute thank goodness.




this is super hero jax ~


and super hero henry~



well, that's it. if you're still reading, bless your heart. i can't believe it took me so long
to get this post written, and guess what? 
there is  still one more about the wedding day and more of the fun i haven't shared yet.
and i will share some of their photographers pics too~



but for now
lars and i are leaving in two days for my first ever destination wedding shoot.
yes, it's true. we hardly ever get out of dodge, and we're excited to be 
heading to marco island to photograph a wedding for friends!

i told him last night if it goes well, this could be our next career.
he and i, destination wedding photography team.
jet setting about the country,
never home to mow.

i'll get back to you on this one.

xox, beth