Find Your Local Florist:Everything you want to know about flowers!
Not sure what to get them for their birthday this year? Flowers are always a gift that they’ll love to receive. Take out the guesswork and send September babies an arrangement including their birth month flower—the aster! Keep reading to see what makes asters special:
For those of you who didn’t know, Aster is the flower of September. The blooms in the Aster genus are daisy-like and have grown continuously since ancient times. Want to learn more about the star looking flower? Keep reading!
September’s birth flower is the Aster, and that makes it the perfect choice for our September Flower Spotlight. A gorgeous bloom that looks like a star burst and whose name means star, it makes the perfect gift for any September event!
As usual with Greek mythology, there is more than one tale that explains the presence of these beautiful flowers. The first says that the goddess Virgo spread star dust upon the earth and it took root to eventually become the Aster. Another says that the goddess Asterea began to cry when she looked upon the earth and saw no stars there. Her tears became the lovely Aster.
Another legend comes from the Cherokee Indian tribe. They believed that two warring tribes destroyed a village, leaving only two sisters as survivors. The two women wore doe skin dresses, one dyed lavender blue with fringe and the other bright yellow. They took refuge with an old herb woman who saw into the future and realized they would be hunted down and killed by their enemies. To help them avoid this fate, she turned them into flowers. The first sister became the blue aster and the second was the yellow goldenrod.
Ancient peoples believed that the smell of burning aster leaves would drive away serpents. The French would place them on the graves of fallen soldiers to symbolize the wish that things had turned out differently.
The aster means patience, love, daintiness and good-luck. When given as a gift it means admiration and love, and can also mean elegance. It is often seen as a talisman of love, and in China they are a symbol of fidelity.
The aster is a magnificent flower with a rich history and a beautiful mythology. It’s the perfect gift for a September birthday, a welcome surprise for your heart’s true love or just because you like to give gorgeous blooms! As always, remember to buy local!
If you watched the Game of Thrones season 4 premier, (Don’t worry if you have yet to see it, we won’t spoil you here.) you may have spotted some lovely red, white and blue flowers gifted to the Khaleesi. (If you didn’t see it, click this link for a non-spoilery image!) That got us to thinking, what would make a better gift to a fan of the show than giving them an arrangement inspired by that scene for their very own?
I know what you’re thinking, “Put together an arrangement based on some flowers glimpsed for a few brief moments on a tv show? That’s impossible!” but you’d be wrong. In fact, the secret to creating a similar look is in the flowers used. Fortunately for us, our very own Mandy Maxwell used her sharp vision to discover and name those flowers for you. They are:
Step 2 of this flower theme creation is to walk into a local flower shop and be ready to give your florist some details regarding what you’d like to see. Your local florist is also a local artist, and they are often not only happy but even excited to face a challenge.
Still, this won’t be quite as challenging as it could be. The flowers involved are all very popular blooms and the florist shouldn’t have any trouble getting her hands on some. The biggest hitch you might run into would be the blue roses as they would most likely have to be a special order. But hey, your Game of Thrones fan is worth it, right?
So get ready to “Wow!” that rabid Game of Thrones fan, especially if she’s also a fan of flowers (and really, who isn’t?) No time better than now to head over to your local florist and place that order!
*Blue Rose image taken from 3rdbillion
*White Aster image taken from Power of the Flower
Mothers love anything that reminds them of their children–including flowers! Harness the deep meaning of flowers this year to create a personalized Mothers Day Bouquet with a bloom to represent each of her children. Similar to the popular mother’s ring, these gorgeous bouquets are a wonderful Mother’s Day Gift that hold special meaning and brighten Mom’s day!
Sweet Pea Represents April Birthdays!
Work with your local florist to choose blooms that represent the birth month of each of your siblings and design a bouquet to send on Mother’s Day. These creative, colorful bouquets will touch Mom’s heart and include all of your siblings in showing her how much you care. Here’s a quick guide to finding your birth month flower:
As you can see, there are few options per month, making it easy to create a beautiful Mother’s Day Bouquet! It’s that simple! Call your florist, tell her your chosen flowers and let her work her magic!
This is also perfect for Moms who live far away. Locate a local florist near you mother and tell her your brilliant idea! Your mom will appreciate the extra effort making her Mother’s Day one to remember!
“He loves me, he loves me not … he loves me!”
For most of us, the daisy brings back a host of childhood memories filled with outdoor play and sunshine! Hours of fun making daisy chains and determining whether “He loves me,” or not. Recent popularity of the Gerber daisy has brought daisies into the spotlight once again. However, the classic white and yellow daisy and the Gerber daisy are actually two separate plants all together! In fact, the most commonly called “daisy” flowers are 3 separate genus’.
Daisy
Scientific name: Asteraceae
Use: Flower
Type: Herbacious Perennials
DESIGNING
Stem: 8-32″
Blossom Size: 2-5″
Texture: Satin
Colors: Variety
Bloom Season: Late spring, early summer
Flowers Available: Year Round
TYPES OF ‘DAISIES’
The common daisy we all know and love is a Bellis perennis. This little beauty has been found in paintings, furnishing, and jewelry dating back to the ancient Egyptians. It has been inspiration for artists, poets, songwriters and other such artists:
The Daisy follows soft the Sun —
And when his golden walk is done —
Sits shyly at his feet —
He — waking — finds the flower there —
Wherefore — Marauder — art thou here?
Because, Sir, love is sweet!
-From Emily Dickinson’s The Daisy follows soft the Sun
This simple flower is used to symbolize innocence and purity, as well as new beginnings. The unique smell is the reason it was taken out of the Genus Chrysanthemum and moved to the Genus Leucanthemum.
Chrysanthemums are the second commonly used ‘daisy’. Often called daisy poms, these little guys tend to have a more greenish colored center. This is the type (other than Gerbs) most commonly used in floral arrangements.
The Gerbera, or Gerber Daisy is the fifth most used cut flower in the world. Their flower heads are huge, and their slender stem makes them gorgeous in arrangements. If you’re girlfriend says “Daisies are my favorite flowers,” she is probably referring to these beauties.
EXTREME DAISIES
If you’ve never made a daisy chain, you’re missing out! My cousin and I used to make bracelets, necklaces, crowns — everything when we were little girls. You simply can’t play fairies without one!
How to make a daisy chain:
It’s super easy. Take care to pick daisies with about 2½-3″ stems. At the very end of the stem use your fingernail or some other flat, sturdy tool to cut a slit the daisy’s stem. Take another daisy and insert into the slit you just made. Cut a slit into that daisy and repeat. To finish, cut a large slit and stuff the flower head into it. These can be as long or short as you want. Be creative and attempt new styles … Can you make a double daisy chain?
Daisies have almost come to represent girlishness in general. I am in love with some of the daisy items I’ve found researching this post:
English Garden Style Arrangement For Searcy AR Wedding
History: English-garden designs are inspired by early English gardens which people had at their homes to produce vegetables, flowers, herbs and fruit trees. These items were grown for their fragrance, cosmetic and/or medicinal purposes.
English gardens went by many names at the time including “kitchen gardens,” “cottage gardens,” and “cuttings gardens.” Among those credited with developing the modern English garden floral style are Constance Spry, Julia Clements, and Gertrude Jekyll.
Style: Loosely structured oval or round arrangements of a variety of garden flowers (or flowers that can be easily grown in a garden). No particular style (form, filler, line, mass) of bloom is used. No particular amount is selected. This style is based on the availability of flowers grown in a home’s garden and therefore represent a less defined but very “full” look.
Flowers Used: Popular flowers in modern English Garden style designs are spike flowers including larkspur, delphinium, foxglove, hollyhock, and snapdragon. Popular mass flowers used include tulips, snowballs, marigolds, sweet peas, geraniums, stock, aster, daisies, lilies, poppies, cornflowers, all kinds of roses and carnations, lavendar, dahlias, ranunculus, anemones, and agapanthus.
All flowers used must bloom in the same season. Compatibility of the flowers is very important as this style reflects what home gardens would have had at a particular time, far before worldwide delivery was readily available.
The use of fragrant flowers and herbs is appropriate.
Basic Characteristics: Features more foliage than many other styles. The use of evergreens and woody-stemmed, leafy foliage is popular. Examples of these are Euonymus, Pittosporum, Camellia, huckleberry, boxwood and blackberry.) Weeping or trailing ivies or materials are popular with this style. Plumed grasses are appropriate as well.
Full, large arrangements that are usually round or oval. They are characterized mostly by their use of a wide variety of flowers and keen use of foliage.
Usually seen in bright, complementary colors. However, monochromatic or analogous color harmonies have become appropriate choices for modern renditions of this style.
Containers Used: While vases are often used in English Garden styles, most floral arrangements in this style are featured in an urn or similar container with durability, strength and a unique appearance.
Fret not, dear blog reader. I have your answer.
The September birth month flowers are the aster and the morning glory. Oh yeah, beautiful and meaningful. Good stuff. If you were a reader last year you may remember “Mark September With An Aster-isk”, our friendly reminder blog about the birth month flower of September. You may also remember that September can be quite a headache for my family! With three birthdays on the same day stuff gets really crazy toward the middle of the month.
Mom is great. She’s one of my favorite people in the whole world and I’d be lost without her. That’s a great (and true) sentiment for the card, but you can’t really package that. Oh wait, yes you can! It may not come in a box but a birthday bouquet with aster is a package that she’ll be happy to receive! I’m thinking that showing it off to her friends at work will be fun for her given the type of women she works with. If I can make her day better, why not? So this year I’m sending Mom the gift that she loved last year — asters.
Ask Your Florist About Aster This September
Now the other Virgo in my life is a bit harder. I tend to stop by game stores a lot when shopping for him but I’m pretty tired of staring at electronics. By the time I muster up the courage to go shopping, the last place I want to be is somewhere that will take a lot of time. Plus, I can never remember which games he has so I get a gift card. It’s a little impersonal (or so he said last year) so I don’t want to repeat that experience.
My Love may be brutally honest but he has a point so I’m sending him aster flowers instead. It’s kind of payback for the comment about the gift card. Plus, his daughter loves playing with flowers and dirt and bugs and grass so we’ll have a lot of fun planting morning glory in the backyard. This may not be the ideal way to send birth month flowers of September. Given that not everyone lives in a fairytale world of romance and lollipops, I’m sure I’m not the only one who finds this a funny alternative.
Regardless of your intent, you really can’t go wrong with birth month flowers. They’re just too cool! Plus they’re really unique so you don’t have to worry about someone copying your idea. It’s all yours. Be your own with aster and morning glory this September.
