Those color things ARE old fashioned, and all the lists I’ve been forced to look at are contradictory, but there’s one spoiler in every office to try to make people fee bad with it.
Fortunately, I’ve always known the recipient long enough beforehand not to get stung by her’s coworker’s barbs. But it is a pitfall for anyone who dares to ignore the red roses lobby. Of course, there too, the snipers will get you with “of course just ONE dozen isn’t an insult Dearie, you needn’t be ashamed,” as if they’d gotten a better gift lately.
Pepperlandgirl has a point, I think. I know people that live on under $800/month who spend $50-60 dollars on flowers for events like Valentine’s day because they feel like they “have to”. The flowers are gone in a few days, but the bills are still there, and the stress from them seems to go a long way towards erasing the memory. $50-60 spent on a luxury that will last–like sexy underware, or a video game, or an appliance, or even a rose bush (provided the recipient is the type to not mind taking care of it), makes more sense to me, too, unless you are in the sort of financial bracket where getting flowers dosen’t mean giving up anything else in particular. To each his own, of course, but I think some people sometimes give and recieve flowers on certain occaions more because they feel that it is expected than because they’ve thought it through.
If I had to choose, though, I like mixed arrangements best–lots of conflicting colors and textures and smells. Why is it that you never see different colors of roses mixed together?
My guy is not a flower-giver. I’ve only received flowers from him three times in 15 years – once each after each kid was born and once on Valentine’s Day during Desert Storm. Someone on his ship set up a bulk flower sending for all the wives, husbands and SOs back home. This guy went around the ship, collected the money, then put in the order. We all got the same arrangement – one of those mixed dealies in a LOVE coffee mug. Kind of generic (as were the flowers Kevin sent when the kids were born) but very nice and welcome.
Kevin doesn’t try harder in this respect because he knows I don’t especially care. …However, if he WERE to send me flowers I would prefer carnations (for the scent) or daffodils (for the color) to roses.
My BF once gave me a beautiful glass rose, with a single gold thorn. It was wonderful, and still one of my treasured possesions.Mainly because he thought to himself “Self, Haley doesn’t like flowers, but I know she likes the way they look. I’ll give her one that will never die”
The thing is, I would rather have a poem that he wrote rather then an expensive bouquet of flowers. I would rather my guy surprise me with something that I have already said I liked/wanted/needed. He once bought me a stapler for my B-Day because I NEEDED one. Not very romantic, but it was thoughtful.
I would rather receive a whole plant that I could put in a garden that wouldn’t die. But wasting so much money on some flowers that will DIE. That seems stupid and wasteful to me. Why pay up $60 or more on something that will be gone? Maybe I’m just too cheap.
A few weeks ago, friends sent us a big bouquet of tiger lilies. They came as buds and opened over the next two days. Gorgeous. The lilies turned out to be peach, white, yellow, and pink. While they were still blooming, My SO and I would make bets on what color particular buds would be. Definitely a new favorite flower for me.
As the daughter of a gardener, different flowers mean different things for me. Lilacs mean that summer is just around the corner, and their sweet smell reminds me of when I was 6, and would hide in the lilac bush and just inhale the purfume. Tiger lilys remind me of my mom’s garden outside the kitchen, where nothing else would grow. Tulips were the only flower my mother would allow my father to attempt to grow. (“Plant 'em in the fall, they’ll grow in the spring, can’t be easier.” Snapdragons were handsdown my favorite flower as a kid, my parents got me a bouquet when I graduated high school, it was the sweetest thing. My mom has a HUGE bleeding heart bush which I always though was the most beautiful thing in the world, both for the flower, and the name. Irises make me think of the wild patch of them I found once in the woods, I don’t know if it was an old, abandoned garden or what, but I found about 15 purple irises growing in the middle of a forest. And Stargazer Lilys, well, those are just stunning. Simple, and classic.
But I’m not a big fan of roses. They don’t grow well this far north (at least not cultivated ones, wild ones do, but they don’t look anything like the ones you’d think of.) They’re almost too uncreative. But, hey, I wouldn’t refuse them at the door!
Now as far as giving goes, I am apt to give irises, if available, or tulips. If I’m being a little more playful, daisies, sun flowers, asters, black-eyed-susans or some other sort of “sunburst” flower is my call.
I almost always give irises. I’m just too predictable… if purple is an option, I choose purple. I am not opposed to roses though, but I do oppose the rose/diamond mafia that thinks that if you don’t buy someone two dozen roses and a big diamond ring, you don’t truly love them. To me gifts are because I’m thinking of you, not because hallmark said I must.
Well the criteria a woman bases what she likes to get versus what a man uses in what he likes to give is going to be different. I know that women want it to be beautiful as well as show some thought went into selecting it, and of course originality counts. However, from my viewpoint as a man, unless it is for a very special occasion, and Valentine’s day doesn’t count as one, I want maximum flower wattage with minimum thought/effort. So roses will almost always get my dollars unless there is some pretty, already made up, already to walk out with the store with it as soon as I pay for it, type of bouquet there in the store.
Many moons ago, when my SO and I were dating, I woke up after our first night together. (Uh uh, of course, I just fell asleep on the couch, Mom!) Anyway, about 1/2 hour later, he came home with a vase of 12 yellow roses for me. I thought it was the most beautiful bouquet I ever saw.
Then, a couple years ago, after the birth of our son, he brought 12 white roses to me in the hospital. That replaced the yellow ones as my favorite.
As far as “special events”, giving roses is the tops. However, I love tulips or daisies on my kitchen table. Pretty!!
