It all started last year when I took an online illustration class and the instructor suggested that we get outside and find flowers to draw.
LOL! She lived in the southern part of the U.S. where it might be perfectly normal to walk outside in April and find flowers, but for me living in Colorado that was not an option. There was snow to shovel!
So I decided to buy a bouquet.
It wasn't like I'd never done that before, but it felt indulgent. Weren't flowers for special occasions and not a random Tuesday night? But I felt like I had a valid excuse: I needed these flowers for class! It was a requirement! Like a textbook or a highlighter pen!
I picked out a 4.99 bouquet at Trader Joe's and started doing a little drawing. I was hooked. I decide to try buying flowers for a year to practice drawing.
Here's a snapshot collage showing some of my bouquets over the year:
I learned a few things:
- It doesn't have to be expensive.
I mostly bought the 4.99 bouquets at Trader Joe's about once a month. So that would be around $60 a year on flowers if I bought one every month. I did buy one $12 bouquet in early May, but I also skipped a few months in the winter when the flowers weren't available. (I'm guessing having flowers right by the door that kept being opened into the blowing snow wasn't great for the flowers.)
Of course, budget is relative! Sometimes you can get single blooms inexpensively at a farmer's market or you might find bouquets marked down after big floral holidays like Valentine's Day or Mother's Day. (For tips about buying grocery store flowers specifically, see "I Used to Be a Grocery Store Florist.") You could also plant a package of wildflowers from seed and then pick your own bouquets during the summer months. - Avoid decision fatigue and just buy them!
This was a tip I picked up from Modern Mrs. Darcy's blog post on simple abundance. Since I knew I was going to buy flowers every store visit, then I could just pick out a bouquet I liked. Before I started doing this, I would stress over finding the "perfect" bouquet and then spend way too much time worrying whether or not to buy them. (And I usually didn't buy them because I was trying to be "practical.") - Most people don't buy flowers for themselves.
When researching this blog post, I saw an awful lot of headlines like "Is it okay to buy yourself flowers?" According to the Society of American Florists, 33% of people surveyed bought fresh flowers for themselves; the others bought them as gifts. Many more bought garden plants for themselves, which is definitely a great option if you have some space for planting whether in a small container or a large backyard. (You can read more statistics on flower buying if you're interested.)
It was funny to me that some of the cashiers would ask if it was a "special occasion" when they saw the bouquet and seemed a bit flummoxed when I said no. But most didn't ask. They seemed much more curious about the chocolates I was buying (a totally normal amount)! - You might need to get creative with vases.
I'll be honest that my vase collection is mainly vases that other people have given me over the years. And that meant that I actually didn't have many vases that were the right size and shape for the tiny bouquets I'd bought. I used old jars or other containers and those mostly worked well. - You'll learn a lot about flowers ... if you want to.
I recognized a few flowers right away: carnations, roses, daisies, lilies. (If you buy cheaper bouquets, you will notice that some of the same flower types appear regularly.) I researched ones that I didn't recognize, but this does not need to be a homework assignment! It's fine to just enjoy having a pretty bouquet on your table.
One thing I learned about the Trader Joe's bouquets in particular is that sometimes you can't see all the flowers at the top because of the way they're packaged. So if you're choosing bouquets based on the flowers you can see, you might have a surprise or two when you get home! - You might find unexpected inspiration.
I made a lot of flower-inspired art over the past year. I made more than 20 floral fabric designs in my Spoonflower shop, a pair of wooden flower earrings and matching necklace, and lots of sketches and paintings. While some of them were inspired directly by specific flowers, not all were. Just having a rotating vase of flowers in the house where I saw them every day seemed to be enough to keep flowers in my mind as an art subject. I learned that I did prefer drawing from real life rather than a photograph, perhaps because it was easy for me to try and draw from different angles and throughout the bouquet's lifespan.
If art is not your thing, it's possible that the bouquets might inspire you in other ways: new color combinations for decorating, gardening ideas, cake decoration motifs, floral-themed blouses or dresses. - Flowers will brighten your living space.
I was surprised at how much more cheerful my kitchen table felt with a bouquet of flowers in the center. It was like having a little piece of art, but one that I could change every month. I found that I enjoyed looking at the flowers every day to see how they changed. A bouquet typically lasted around two weeks with some single blooms lasting longer.
This might be one reason buying flowers was a TikTok trend in 2022, at least according to this article. Apparently, a bouquet of flowers is a symbol of self-care and a mood booster. I may not be on TikTok, but I can confirm that flowers did seem to make me happier! And in that regard, five dollars a month feels like a bargain.