Bridezillas and snowdrops

The US show Bridezillas is a guilty pleasure of mine, although I'd advise any would-be florist against watching it, as it will give you nightmares. I saw an episode today where one bride was told that her favourite flower, the gardenia, would not be in bloom for her wedding. Apart from bemusement at the diva-style tantrum that she threw, my reaction to her insistence on getting out-of-season flowers for her wedding was a) if the gardenias are so important to you, why didn't you (as many people do) get married during the flowering season of the wedding blooms that you want? And b) this is nature. You can't expect nature to fit around your wedding!

My own patience (well, mostly patience) has been rewarded - today I went to the greenhouse and saw that the first of the bulbs I planted last year has flowered. The snowdrops are beautiful - tiny and delicate and white - and although I had hoped, perhaps unrealistically, to have flowers on Christmas Day, having flowers two weeks into January is a lovely start to the new year.

I didn't want to 'force' them, but now they're flowering, I've brought them indoors so they can be seen and enjoyed all day.

Fast away the old year passes

I did my last Christmas arrangement on Christmas Eve. It was quite sad to pack away the remaining baubles and cinnamon sticks, but never mind - Christmas will come around again quickly enough. Here are photos of some of the arrangements I did as presents or to brighten up my home.

Here's the Christmas topiary tree that I made in college, once I'd found an angel for the top.

And on Christmas Day, I did run over to the greenhouse, like the boy ran outside in The Snowman, only to be met with mild disappointment that my snowdrops hadn't flowered yet.

Back indoors, there was baking to be done. Lavender cupcakes, unintentionally decorated with Manchester City blue icing, mince pies and cheese straws. I'll just have to be patient and wait for the snowdrops.

Let it Snow! Let it Snow! Let it Snow!

I used to steadfastly stick to a 'no Christmas talk before December' rule – I wanted the Christmas season to feel short and special, and that wasn’t going to happen if there were mince pies and carols two months before. Now that I’ve entered the world of floristry, the goal posts have shifted a bit. I made my first Christmas arrangement yesterday. And on Wednesday, when a friend from my floristry course and I hopefully manage to get a pitch at a market, I will have made several more.

For this little table centre, I used fake snow-covered thistles, bright red hypericum berries, beautifully glossy ilex leaves, a little gypsophila, and a few spray carnations that have the marvellous name ‘Mr Rooney’. I had a candle disaster, and ended up using a scented candle that is a little too small for this arrangement. But hopefully my friends, who this is for, will forgive me!

I used a few broken stems of hypericum, a thistle, and some ilex leaves to make myself a buttonhole. I know corsages are meant to be for women and buttonholes for men, but just as I sometimes prefer to wear men’s trainers (they are better for playing football, albeit badly), I also prefer to wear buttonholes. I felt suitably Christmassy wearing this one as I caught up with friends at the beautiful William Morris exhibition at 2 Temple Place today.

And in other news, I got a lovely surprise when I walked around the garden last week. Firstly, there were a couple of very late roses that had blossomed. And secondly, my snowdrops have started shooting. I’ve heard that they rarely flower in their first year, but I’m keeping my fingers crossed. Let it snowdrop!

How does your garden grow?

Roald Dahl, whose writing I adored as a child and still love as an adult, wrote a marvellous parody of the nursery rhyme ‘Mary, Mary, quite contrary’ which features in his collection of poems, Rhyme Stew:

‘Mary, Mary, quite contrary
How does your garden grow?
“I live with my brat in a high-rise flat
So how in the world would I know.” ’

Now I don’t live in a high-rise flat, but I am a novice at this gardening lark. I've felt incredibly inspired by Sarah Raven, who is to gardening what Jane Packer is to floristry, and I've been devouring her book, The Cutting Garden, every day. It's a must-read if you want to grow your own flowers for cutting - there are garden plans for each season, ideas for seasonal flower arrangements, and huge section giving detailed information on different plants to grow for cutting, including particular varieties for their colour or scent.

Today we started to prepare a bed for daffodil, muscari and tulip bulbs. I can’t believe I actually used a wheelbarrow without any disasters.

I’ve planted hyacinth, ranunculus, Anemone De Caen, and snowdrop bulbs in pots and left them in the greenhouse (which is in dire need of a tidy up). I’ve already learnt one lesson, which is that labels shouldn’t be written with a water-soluble pen! We’ll see whether I have any success with the flowers in the spring.