December’s “You Deserve a Bouquet Today” Winner: Dena

December’s “You Deserve A Bouquet Today” contest winner is Dena. Dena’s sister Leann nominated her to win and wrote this about her sister:

“Daily routines are never so simple, when a child you have had a stroke and is crippled. Dena, my sister, you are an inspiration. I know it is hard to deal with Sarah's condition. Here are some flowers to let you know I care. With your girls I hope you do share.”

As I pulled up to the winners house today, I saw 2, beautiful red-headed faces waiting patiently in the window.(I guess they were expecting me). They were off from school and they knew that their mom was getting a “special delivery”.

Dena was surprised and excited about the flowers (so were the girls who were jumping up and down saying “mommy won! mommy won!”).

Dena and I both teared up when I read the note her sister submitted. Sarah, Dena’s daughter was in the living room with a  wide, happy smile on her face!

I can’t imagine the challenges associated with caring for a child with special needs. Reading about Sarah’s story on her website/blog, I was instantly struck by how much this family loves each other and what a dedicated, loving mom Dena is to all her girls.

I am so happy that I was able to bring flowers to this super, deserving mom! Congratulations Dena! You Deserve a Bouquet Today!

We are taking nominations for March’s “You Deserve A Bouquet Today” contest. What better way to brighten someone’s day than with a FREE bouquet of flowers. Nominate someone today on our website or through our Facebook page. Share the Love!

Free Flowers…Now On Facebook

As some of you may know, about six months ago we started the “You Deserve A Bouquet Contest”.  For those of you who haven’t heard of it, here’s how it works. Each month, you can submit someone’s name and a short write up about why they should win free flowers. It’s that easy. Readers vote at the end of the contest period and the nominee with the most votes wins. Then, I bring the winner free flowers. No strings attached! What could be better?

Well, now you can submit your nominees right from Facebook. LoCoFlo’s Facebook page is undergoing some changes (thanks to our awesome tech guy). One of the first changes is make the bouquet contest even easier. Now, you can submit your nominees name and info directly from LoCoFlo’s Facebook page.

Check out some of our past winners! They look happy right? Of course they do! They just won FREE flowers!

I’m looking forward to seeing lots of nominees this month from our over 600 Facebook Fans!

Local Color Flowers Becomes the First Baltimore Florist to Accept Bnotes!

We are so excited to announce that Local Color Flowers is now accepting BNotes! If you haven’t heard of Baltimore Green Currency and the BNote-here’s a little overview.

The BNote is local currency – real money that can be used for any local transaction at the 140 local businesses that accept the Bnote. You can check them all out in the Baltimore Green Currency Directory.

Logistically, here’s how it will work for Local Color Flowers clients. We’ll take up to 10% of all payments in BNotes. That means if you pay 10% of your bill in BNotes, we’ll keep that money circulating within participating local businesses. Win Win!

With LoCoFlo joining Baltimore Green Currency, it’s now possible to use BNotes for all of your wedding needs: food, venue, attire, photography, FLOWERS and more!! 

If you’re using Bnotes for your wedding, let us know! We want to hear from you!

Why I Deliver My Own Flowers

I was in the elevator today at Johns Hopkins delivering Valentine’s Day flowers. A guy was in the elevator with me noticed the (super pretty) flowers and started asking me about them. How much did they cost? What was the vase made out of ? I started in on my “elevator speech” (IN AN ELEVATOR!). I said that the flowers were grown locally on Maryland flower farms. I explained how I go out each week and pick up flowers from the farm…it was then that he stopped me. “This is your business?” “Yes” I said (proudly). “And you don’t have a delivery person?”. ..And then the elevator opened and he was gone.

Of course we do have some GREAT delivery helpers, but for the most part, I do all of the everyday deliveries myself. One of the big reasons I do this work is to make connections with people. I love arriving at someone’s front door and seeing the joy in their face when the receive the flowers. I love telling them what’s in the arrangements (today there were tulips, lilies, white forsythia, cornel dogwood and eucalyptus) and where the flowers came from (today they came from Farmhouse Flowers, Plant Masters, Seaberry Farm and Van Dyke Tulips). I love hearing about their sons, friends, wives and loved ones that sent them the flowers.

I can’t lie. I get a little teary at most deliveries. Is that weird? It hasn’t worn off yet after four years. I still LOVE  it.

Locally Grown Flowers in February!

February in Maryland is pretty awesome. Especially this year with mild temps and sunny days. This week we’ve had a great variety of flowers, foliage and flowering branches to work with.

On Tuesday, I went down to Annapolis for the last Maryland Growers meeting before the season. This meeting is always fun, interesting and informative. It’s especially fun for me because I get to see some of my grower friends that I rarely see and when they can, they bring me flowers. This week, I picked up some early forsythia and cornel dogwood from Seaberry Farm.

Today I headed out to Farmhouse Flowers to pick up tulips, lilies, dusty miller and stock. The stock was stunning!

I also picked up some cool quince, white forsythia, paper whites and daffodils from Plant Masters.

All of these flowers, foliage and branches made for some really cool, (early) Spring arrangements.

I was excited to welcome a new design assistant today too!Carling’s first arrangements turned out great. She used eucalyptus, paper whites, stock, tulips, kalanchoe and curly willow in this table arrangement.We’re gearing up for Valentine’s Day next week. If you want to order locally grown flowers for V-Day,  there’s still time to get your order in. Email me today at ellen@locoflo.com

Winter Vacation LoCoFlo Style

I would like to say that last week I escaped the cold of Baltimore and ran away to Florida. I did in fact visit Florida, but apparently it was almost the same temperature as Baltimore!  Heading to Florida was a great change of pace before weddings begin again. Eric and I visited my in-laws for a few days and then drove to the Keys for some R and R.

Of course, no vacation is complete without getting some flower time in. On a recommendation from one of our 2012 brides, we headed to Bahia Honda State Park for hiking. They had a pretty great nature trail by the beach with signage for all of the flowers and foliage along the way.

These weren’t marked-which makes me think they were probably weeds of some sort-but I loved them. I named them hairy beans.

On Friday, we headed down to Key West to meet up Dave Dowling of Farmhouse Flowers. I guess everyone was trying to get a vacation in before the season gets going! It was super fun to hang out in Key West.

We checked out the southern-most tip of the US, visited Ernest Hemingway’s house and did a little street shopping.

We talked flowers and did a little planning for 2012…but we took time out for Key Lime Pie too!

I’m super grateful that I had some time to get away this winter, but I can’t lie…I was really excited to come home and start working on Valentine’s Day, wedding planning and some other surprises we have in store for LoCoFlo in 2012!

Real Weddings: Eleni and Peter

I met Eleni and Peter at an open house at the Belvedere back in March. They were a super cute couple that seemed really excited about their October wedding. The Belvedere was the perfect location for this classic, yet modern couple.

The bride carried a bouquet filled with white and dark purple/burgundy dahlias. The girls wore beautiful eggplant dresses with bouquets that were similar to the brides.  In every picture I’ve seen from the wedding, Peter looks like the happiest man alive. He wore a elegant tuxedo with a simple boutonniere made from a dahlia and a splash of eucalyptus.

For the centerpieces, the couple wanted something low to the table that wouldn’t complete with the grandeur of the ballroom. Since they had purchased cylindrical table numbers (that also doubled as a votive covers) we decided on floral wreaths. While floral wreaths seem like a very traditional centerpiece, we modernized it by using bright green monkey balls, burgundy, white and purple dahlias, and lots of rich colored greens including smoke bush and purple basil. I love how they turned out!

Thanks to our growers for the beautiful flowers-especially Wollam Gardens who provided most of the dahlias. Thank too to the wonderful ladies at Truffles who were a joy to work with. Finally, special thanks to Borrowed Blue Photography for the beautiful photos.

Congratulations to Peter and Eleni! Wishing them many years of happiness together.