back from the front line. (+tacos!)

If you spend time drooling and clipping from foodie mags like I do, then you might imagine how thrilling it was for me to make flowers for a christmas shoot today in Soho for a well know mag that lets just say focuses on food and wine.


It was a tricky Christmas palette to work in March. [White, silver and crimson.] By now Ilex berries have all been eaten by the birds and the holly berry I sourced from Oregon looked like it had been buried in the basement of US Evergreen since last December. But we made it work. We also made a lot of things silver with a can of spray paint, including my [oh SH**] new frye boots. Remember how enthusiastic I was about spray paint at christmas this past year? It's over friends. Not because of my boots, but because each time I sprayed a little silver over my eucalyptus garland in the back yard yesterday I heard a little animal cry out and then perish. No sparkly garland is worth a little animal now is it?


No, it isn't. Now I'm faced with cleaning up this place and getting to work relaxing tonight for the first time in days. Aaron is back from Blacksburg so I should go home to see him and hear about who had a kid, who's still drinking at The Cellar, and who's kid is now old enough to be drinking at The Cellar.

Good nite.


ps; 6 more years: Thou shalt not take awayeth ye old ballfield tacos.

procrastination.

Everything becomes more interesting when your procrastinating. I can't stop thinking about cornichons, what to make for dinner next sunday, the concept of fault, where I could treat myself to a new blouse, and, if forced to eat cat food, whether I would prefer wet or dry. [dry]

In the fourth grade I realized my extraordinary ability to procrastinate. It was the night before the science fair and I was categorically f*@#ed. I had signed up for the INVENTIONS section, excluding the ever-popular pepsi-or-coke-taste-test project which saved the lives of many middle school procrastinators. What resulted after a day of wandering around the house tormenting the cats [an my little sister] was a spaghetti twirling fork involving and electric screw driver. Admittedly, some of my finest work has been done in the 11th hour.

Today, once again, I find myself honing this talent. We're making flowers [and a xmas tree] for a photo shoot tomorrow morning. I have yards of eucalyptus garland to spray paint (let along make) and many flowers to fix up. Eric sits here diligently wrapping soap while I search the internet for how to make an exploding volcano with baking soda. The cool kids always made volcanoes.


[Delivery from yesterday with guinea hens, fringed tulips, ranunculus, and some seeded euc.]

A rare moment of calm coffee out on the street this morning. Swamped with all sorts of different projects this week...so much I want to share right now. Like the Guinea Hens (Fritillaria Meleagris) pictured below and in the arrangement on top. This flower is so special...it's true that they are incredibly fragile, but I'm tired of fearing the fragile flower - flowers are not meant to live forever. Unlike Susan, who told me this morning over our coffee call that she has decided to live forever. [Everything is fodder for the blog mom...]

Incidentally, "Live Forever!" has been our toast since A, E and I read Secret History by Donna Tart.

I hope you toast to something tonight.
Happy weekend - I'll post again soon -- Sarah

everyone knows its Windy.

Windy and stormy this morning as Eric takes off to visit headquarters upstate. I'm staying behind to meet with a lady about some wedding flowers, spray paint some things silver for a Christmas Tree (i'll explain why next week), and generally enjoy having the place to myself.

This amazing picture comes from my new friend Barbara. One of the many pleasures of running a small business is meeting folks in far flung places with setups so different from ours - but with similar motivations. I've been learning all about Barbara's farm, Pine Ridge Orchids, and the fragile ecosystem of the Everglades -- and am gearing up to share it here this weekend.

What else do I want to mention this morning....OH YES, I think I'm making a delivery in Williamsburg tomorrow afternoon (Thursday) -- so I'll do free delivery for anyone in the 'burg. Just email or call before 1pm tomorrow.

-sarah

soap wrapping.

When I was a kid my mom would section off part of the house for wrapping Christmas gifts. She would sing this little jingle which I totally loved:

Wrap-a-wrap-a-wrap, they call me the wrapper. Wrap-a-wrap-a-wrap, there's nobody faster.

Had I known at the time that I would have entire days when I could not get this jingle out of my head, or that I would have weeks where I would average approx. 25.4 bars of soap per hour in a 24 hour period, I may have thought differently of it.

I'm really not a product person, but the green tube you see is Weleda skin food, the best hand cream in the universe.

forsythia; harbinger of spring and other yellow.

[Forsythia/my bed/poppy closeup/chart of Winter Harbor, ME]

It's true that sometimes you notice a certain color more than others.

Which is a good thing, because usually I am drawn to black ... not a natural match for our aesthetic at Saipua. Not now at least.

This winter has been a real brute for me...I won't go into too much detail, other than to say I have the sudden ability to sleep late every morning (never before could I sleep past 8am) and that my winter blues are less charming than they have been in years past. But March is a whole new ballgame - it's going to be 50 degrees this week, I just unearthed my copy of Simon and Garfunkel Live in Central Park, and I have a compost bin to figure out (with two months' worth of kitchen scraps collecting in a rot bucket under our sink).

So onward!

New Candles and Deep Thoughts

Sometimes when I post a picture like this I feel it should be accompanied by one of Jack Handy's DEEP THOUGHTS.

****

We have been working on the spring votive candles. We make them in collaboration with the folks at Oakmont Candle Co., a family affair in Pittsburg whose idealogy and business model is pretty similar to ours. We received the two prototypes a few weeks ago and I have been burning them in the shop. The first is CEDARMOSS - a rich, damp green-wood smell ...the second is WISTERIA LILAC; a bright floral emphasizing the sweet high notes of lilac. We've been toying with what to call them. So many fragrances and candles have extravagant names like...Quest...Moraccan Mist...Provencal Dewberry Sunrise. What is a dewberry??

I'm finishing the new packaging this weekend and will share it here soon.

We should be ready to ship 'em in about 2 weeks...thanks to those of you who have placed your orders already.