request from a friend...

... to make some silk wedding flowers. It got complicated, as things tend to do, when you think: Oh, sure! It will be a snap!' (as in putting your thumb and second finger together and going: snap! and it's over, complete, finished.) Well, not so much. This has been going on for weeks, involving numerous trips to all the craft stores in town, and several conversations with the friend who is a cashier at work. Her niece is getting married in August. M. has been offered, or drafted into setting the scene for many relatives and friends who are getting hitched: organized, planned, decorated, perfected her skills for generating frou-frou in rented spaces to a professional level.

The bridesmaids' bouquet made long enough to hold with the addition of some cheating: using a wooden dowel to extend too short stems of wired silk flowers, taped into place, which will be covered with silk ribbon to hide all the mechanics no one needs to see or know.

I've agreed to help a couple of times, making some of the decorations for the people involved: boutonnieres and corsages for those attending the couple as they step into the unknown. I would say step out into married bliss, but after a few years, maybe not so much. As is often the case, these people have been cohabiting for so long they may already know each other too well.  Including in the carnal sense, as they frequently have young children who are included in the proceedings as attendants: ring-bearers and flower girls, tossing petals helter-skelter as they traipse down the aisle preceding the mom/bride.

                                             four corsages and five boutonnieres for guys
M. is very smart and capable, making me start to believe she is asking me to do things she does not want to devote her time to. I've not asked to be paid when doing other jobs for her, and have actually refused her offer of cash or gift cards in the past, but this has gotten so tedious I am reconsidering being so generous.Thinking I will tell her a price and let the bride pick up the tab for corsages, hand-held nosegays for the bridesmaids and boutonnieres for the lapels of grooms' support team and dads. This project has taken so much time I am getting dangerously close to the 'get it done' part, so need to finish up and get it out of my life.

It is coming together, and I hope to have it all finished to deliver to M. at work later today. I have lots of other little projects that have been awaiting my attention that need to get squared away in the next few days while I am  not working. Who would have thought procrastination could be such a skilled occupation? Too bad there is no demand: I would be rolling in the dough if 'putting off' was a paying job!