Valentine’s Day

Wedding Movies, Take 1? Take 2? Take as many as you can before Valentine’s Day

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It’s the season when Hollywood breaks out the movies to bring on that itch to get married.  Coincidence that most engagements take place between Christmas and Valentine’s Day, and that there’s usually a matching break-out bunch of rom-coms featuring diamond sparklers and lacy veils around the same time? Maybe, but I don’t think so.  Here are a few of the Wedding themed films/TV entertainment coming out this December:

The Big Wedding – this one looks like it might be a Big Hit!
  • Cheerful Weather For The Wedding  – a “will she or won’t she?” set in 1930s England
  • The “Royal Pains” Wedding Episode – a 2 hour extended episode of your fave handsome MD in The Hamptons’ adventures
  • The Big Wedding – a star studded (we’re talking Robert DeNiro, Diane Keaton, Susan Sarandon and a slate of young guns too) remake of a French wedding comedy about a not-so-happy couple keeping up appearances at their son’s wedding.

There are certainly more.  Keep your eyes peeled for dresses, bouquets and other ideas that spin your wheels. Hollywood wedding inspiration, take 1!

Be well, and love well.

-Dinah

The Mass Produced Floral Assembly Line (Why Not To Order Mass Produced Flowers For Mother’s Day)

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After graduating from the floral design program at SCROC (Southern California Regional Occupational Center), I pounded the pavement looking for paid work as a floral designer.  You don’t just sashay into a place like My Little Flower Shop and say “I’m here now, show me your centerpieces, teach me your aesthetic and I’ll revolutionize your tablescapes.” You have to pay your dues.  And pay I did.

My first gig was at a big national chain florist, in the run-up towards Valentine’s Day.  The kind with the “official” arrangements available everywhere. The shop I worked at is on a corner best known to hot-dog connossieurs as home to one of LA’s historic hot dog stands.  But my workspace wasn’t street facing.  It wasn’t anything facing.  It was a shipping container. One end was left open, and one side lined with tables.  There were five of us, who stood in the shipping container eight hours a day making “dozen reds” (a dozen red roses with baby’s breath and ferns).  We made them, and then walked them to another shipping container across the alley, filled with shelves.  This started 10 days before Valentine’s, and kept going right through that day. Dozen red after dozen red. Chili-dog smell upon chili-dog smell.

An arrangement for Mom with heart and soul!

When one of our My Little Flower Shop arrangements arrives somewhere, the recipient can see that we are passionate about what we do.  When a girl got a “dozen red” that had been wilting in a shipping containers for 8 days, what do you think she saw?  I haven’t gotten a chance to drive by and check, but I bet dollars to donuts that a shipping conatiner full of underemployed, depressed designers is out there knocking out “Mom Bokays.”  Is that what you want dropped off at your Mom’s house?  Didn’t think so.

So skip the cookie-cutter ProFlowers, FTD, Teleflora nonsense.  Go with a real business who will make a real, unique arrangement with real feeling.  And who would never put a designer in a shipping container.

Live well, and love well.

Dinah

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My Little Wedding Advice Shop: Brides, To Thine Own Self Be True (and Caring)!

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My Little Wedding Advice Shop: Brides, To Thine Own Self Be True (and Caring)!

A bride of ours has had a hard week. Two of her bridesmaids have had “midnight meltdowns” requiring phone conversations into the wee hours. Her work hours stay the same, as always, so she’s tired and stressed out. Not exactly optimal conditions for managing her own wedding planning tasks which are weighing on her, making her more stressed out, so she’s staying up late…it’s a vicious cycle.

For the best wedding day, be kind to yourself in the months beforehand

   Does this sound familiar? Are you a “rock” in the lives of a   lot of the people you know? Well, now that you are in wedding planning mode there’s someone more important that you’ve got to make your number one priority: yourself. It’s hard to say no, and to tell people you can’t be available in ways you have been, but planning a big celebration of a rite of passage is no small task, and comes with stressors of its own, both physical and emotional. You can’t spend your energy taking care of everyone else in your life because there will be nothing left for you.

So we advised our bride to gently ease herself out of the role of “rock,” because she’s got a rock of her own now, and will want all her energy to ride the rollercoaster that is planning a wedding. Good advice for any overextended bride. As RuPaul says, “if you can’t love yourself, how in the hell are going to love somebody else?” She always asks if she can get an Amen at that point – and I will give one. Amen!

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