Most of the Master Gardener classes have been pretty practical: soil and water conservation, basic botany, integrated pest management. This past Thursday, though, we got to get our hands dirty and play. VT actually has a real course in floral design complete with a giant refrigerator room and shelves of various flower containers, mountains of that weird green foam stuff, and sort of scary knives. The instructor, who also taught our botany class, gave us a quick overview of floral design, and then we jumped in. (Well, a bunch of us went and ate cookies while the others took all the good flowers.) Here’s what I made.

At the end of the class, the instructor gave a brief critique to everyone. He said mine was a european botanical. European ’cause I squished in lots of flowers and botanical because when he called “5 minutes left,” I started jamming in a bunch of greenery to cover up the foam base. It really was a lot of fun, and I have to quiet the urge to run out and buy a scary floral knife and some of that alien foam. (I asked the instructor what the foam is made out of, and he said, “It’s a secret.” I thought he was kidding, but apparently the floral foam market is very hush hush.)

I asked Anya if she thought I should quit my job and become a florist. She looked at me and said:

I said, “Fine, be a big ole meanie butt! Go play with your v-smile!” She said, “Uh, I don’t have a v-smile because they are dumb. How about I read my book?”