Celebrate the joys of your life with Joie de Vivre.

Joie de Vivre brings freelance floral design to your Northshore, New Orleans and Baton Rouge events. We meet, discuss your vision and collaborate to make your floral idea a reality.

No storefront means no overhead for me and better prices for you. It also means that flowers are purchased for you and only you, allowing you to benefit from the freshest possible product. Attention and creativity is poured into making your event a memorable one, not just some pretty flowers in a vase.


While Joie de Vivre is my business and design is my passion, it all starts with the flower. Hope you enjoy my many ramblings.

Saturday, August 27, 2011

Boeing Classic

We were so excited to earn the business of the Boeing Classic at TPC Snoqualmie Ridge.  This year, the Seattle Seahawks requested flowers to deck their tents and we delivered.  The only guideline was small white vases and green flowers.  Being so tired of seeing blah round mounds of flowers in vases, we were determined to do something different.

Since there were so many pieces to do, why did they all need to be the same?  Keeping with the same collection of flowers, the style varied slightly.  When you’re working with ornithogalum, you have flexible stems—it would be crazy not to take full advantage of that cool trait. So some pieces let those crazy stems meander every which way, while others we manipulated to bend to our ways.  The result?  No round mounds here!



Monday, August 15, 2011

Wildflowers and Weeds



Most days, my daughter and I try to squeeze in a walk.  We live in such a scenic area of North Bend, it’s a sin not to take advantage of nature’s majesty.  So I devised a new challenge for myself.  Create a bouquet with nothing other than flowers and foliage found on our walk.  By the end of the walk, it looked as if I had a handful of weeds, but in the end, the creation wasn’t half bad. 


Yes it’s simple, but I realize that crazy out of the box design isn’t for everyone.  Some brides want to carry a simple bouquet down the aisle.  It doesn’t get more simple than a few wildflowers organized into a neat little bouquet.  


Wednesday, August 10, 2011

Sensational Seasonals

When you think of summer flowers, what vision of beauty comes to mind? Delicious dinnerplate dahlias?  Sumptuious hydrangeas?  Delicate sweet peas?  All those flowers are fabulous, and I admired all of those beauties when I visited my local supplier, but what really made an impression were the cobra lilies. 
Yes, I said cobra lilies, but no, they are not actually  lilies.  They are nicknamed cobra lilies for the way the flower resembles the hood of an Indian Cobra (think snake charmer).  These beauties are part of the pitcher plant family—carnivorous flowers.  With a diet consisting of insects, these exotic flowers can be found in the U.S.—closer than you think—California and Oregon.  I actually have a plant in my backyard; whether it survives our Northwest winter is another story.  I have to say that I am less concerned about about the snakes living near me, even though they are only garter snakes.


Monday, August 1, 2011

A good reason to frequently check your junk folder



Don’t always assume that only unsolicited email goes into your junk folder. I randomly checked mine and low and behold, there was an email with wedding photos.  I’ve been trying to get these for over a year now.  Timing has never been quite right and I had just about given up.  I’m so glad to be able to share them now.  Special thanks to Nostalgia for providing them.