Flowers for the temp!

How lucky was I to temp on the day after Thanksgiving?!  Not only did I cover reception for an empty office and get to surf the internet all day, but I was fed delicious Italian pastries that a famous bakery sent and I also got to take home the insane flower arrangements they get on a weekly basis! 

Everyone who knows me well enough (poor James :) knows that if I'm sent flowers from a florist I almost always pull them apart.  One of the first Valentine's arrangements I ever got I completely changed.  I took the baby's breath out, cut the roses down short and ended up making two smaller arrangements out of the single large one.  This past Friday was no different. 

Here are the flowers I got to take home.  The camera on my phone did not do this arrangement of orange lilies justice at all.  The color was super vibrant and there were a million!  The thing was massive, I couldn't even lift it.  Good thing I wasn't allowed to take the vases ;).

This arrangement is made up of these red tropical plant-like flowers.  Does anyone know what these are?  I have to ask the guys in the flower district next time I'm there. 

So I wrapped up all the flowers and big palm leaves in The Financial Times (way better use than reading it ;) and was on my way.  Once home, I got completely inspired to spruce up my boring vases.  These arrangements really called for rustic and natural looking pottery which I didn't have but I remembered I had a bunch of twine and thin rope. 

So I ended up taking my spray adhesive glue and spraying 2-3 coats on each glass vase (till it looked fogged like in the below picture).  Then I wrapped the twine or rope around the vase and pressed in against the vase firmly as I went around, ensuring each layer was compressed to the bottom one so there were no gaps.  You could even use different colored yarn and layer colors- that would look great too!

Upon completing the vases I began to fill them but there were just way too many flowers.  So I pulled out another two small glass vases and instead covered the inside of the glass vase with palm leaves to give it a super tropical look.  The trick here is to put the leaf in first then add the water so it almost sticks to glass.  These were very structured so even after cutting them they molded to the vase well.

Here's how they all turned out...

Seriously, our apartment looks like a jungle right now!  I even used small vintage bottles I had as vases for the single palm leaves I had left.  Adding a bit of green in the bath or bedroom really gives such a fresh feel. 

Crossing my fingers I luck out with another temp assignment just like this one again very soon! :)