Sending Smiles ~

Late June has us creating designs for every occasion from Get Well, Birthday, Graduation and Beyond. The designers have been having fun with the designs they are making, including the arrangements in the cooler for those who need to dash in and back out!  Fresh cut bouquets of mixed flowers ready for those grab and go customers in a rush.   Summer candles arrived last month and are on full display, including this Sunshine in a Can candle from Aunt Sadies.   Coffee Coasters - a fun gift for the coffee drinkers in your life.   Who doesn't love yellow daisies , right?   Coffee mugs for your favorite nurse!   Gorgeous orchid plants in the shop this week!  We love making plant gardens and new tropical plants just arrived.   These polka dot plants are super cute and easy to care for and grown. The perfect indoor house plant.   Some adorable signage ~ the joy of the Journey is in the Ride.   Fresh stock grown in California just arrived in colors

My name is Georgianne and I'm a flower person. Yes. I have now said it, I love flowers and it doesn't matter the color, shape, type, style ~ you name it I love it. This weekend has us creating floral designs for 3 weddings including this one shown here. Designing with succulents still seems to be a trend that is not going away. This wedding for bride Carla will have using elegant but organic textured flowers such as dahlias, tea and garden roses, hydrangeas with touches of dusty miller and cut succulents. Be sure to check our wedding website early next week to see more photos from this amazing wedding .

National  Nurses  Day is celebrated annually on May 6 to raise awareness of the important role  nurses  play in society. It marks the beginning of National  Nurses Week , which ends on May 12, the birthday of Florence Nightingale. "Advocating, leading, caring" - the slogan of the American Nursing Association (ANA). Gift Idea #1 ~ Flowers! How often do nurses see flowers being delivered for others. This is their chance to receive a fresh floral bouquet! This arrangement is our "Because You're Special Bouquet". Would your favorite nurse love to get this.  Gift Idea #2 ~ Did you know that a few plants in the workplace means 12% less stress? Well, what could be a better gift than a beautiful and healthy indoor plant garden.  Gift Idea #3 ~Why not get an adorable gift items such as this "I'm a Nurse, what's your super power" mug! Only $9.99.  Happy Nurses Week to all those fantastic nurses out there! 

With all the terrible things going on in the world today, it certainly is not a good idea for me to complain about my little pleasant world but it's so nice to finally have a semi-warm day with a shining sun. Here at the shop in Princeton Forrestal Village we are recovering from a very busy Administrative Professionals Holiday week and getting the store ready for Mother's Day . It's always fun when the weather clears up enough for us to place some of our plants and gift ware outside.  If you would like to see all our new Mother's Day offerings for 2015, feel free to check out website at www.sendingsmiles.com . Take peek at both our Mother's Day and Mother's Day Premium categories for great gift ideas. We hope to serve you soon!!  

With all the confusion out there about sending a fresh flower floral gift, I'd like to clarify the best way to find a good florist. Let's say your want to send your mother a lovely floral arrangement for her birthday but she recently moved to a state you are not familiar with. You've never been there and you are not familiar with the florists in the area. In addition you don't want Mom to receive flowers that arrive in a box that she has to design herself. Here's 2 simple steps you can follow to find a good florist fast.   Let your favorite local florist help you. They may not be able to personally deliver but chances are they're part of a floral network of real brick & mortar flower shops that will gladly handle the delivery to your mother. It's called using a relay service. Shops relay to each other to handle out of town orders. We get orders into our shop from other florists and we send our customers orders to them. This relay is be

Right off the bat, I'm going to say that I don't remember who shared the concept of Wiggle Words with me (so I can't give them credit) but this term changed my life! Dramatic? Yes but it truly changed how I communicate. What is a Wiggle Word? A wiggle word is any word that fails to describe. Still confused? In the flower business we hear wiggle words all the time. Customer: "Hello, I'd like to send flowers. Can you make me nice arrangement ?" What does nice mean? What is nice to one person could be not nice to another. Nice, beautiful, pretty ~ all are wiggle words that don't really tell us what you'd like. We love when our customer express themselves! Now taking this from the other side "Yes, we'd be happy to create a nice arrangement for you, how about if we create a very colorful mixture of Spring Flowers "? They might have something else in mind but at least I'm responding with a response that is a bit more descriptive.

One of the best parts of my job is securing flowers to sell at the shop. Whether they are for a special event such as a wedding or just for our everyday offerings, I try to buy American Grown Flowers whenever possible. Truthfully, there aren't many florist grade flowers being grown in PA or New Jersey these days so we look to states such as California for the "locally grown" American product we crave.  Did you know that 80% of the flowers used in America are imported from outside of the US? That's crazy but true! I've personally visited farms in Holland and California and it's fascinating how they grow these amazing beauties. Take for example, the photo below of our tour of the Stock Flower Fields at Ocean View Farms in Lompoc, California We have been known to secure NJ flowers through both our wholesaler and on our own, like these Sunflowers from a past summer! Our designers had fun making little smiley faces on them!  Do you know where the

Are you ready for Spring ? Here at the shop we certainly are! The best part about late February and Early March are all the spring floral arrivals ~ it's at this time of year that the Tulips, Daffodils and Hyacinths are available again. Not only are these flowers gorgeous to look at but they small amazing.  After the winter we have had, we certainly deserve to bring a little cheer into our lives and don't forget, having flowers in your home or office lifts your mood. We're not making that up, studies show that when we live with flowers we feel better and are happier.   Don't forget to spread a bit of cheer to those having birthday's or who are ill. Flowers make a great gift and our designers do a fabulous job creating one of a kind floral designs. 

As a floral shop owner, I love flowers but it's true, as the cobbler has no shoes, often I don't bring flowers home. I probably shouldn't admit that but because I'm surrounded by gorgeous blooms all day long and work 12 hour days, it often doesn't occur to me to grab a bunch when I head out for the evening. Yesterday as the hubby and I closed up for the night, I grabbed a bunch of tulips (one of my all time favorites to bring home) and after cooking and eating dinner, I pulled out a favorite vase to arrange them.  While doing so, I broke a head ~ Oh no! Never fear, look how sweet this single bloom looks in a cute little vase. I posted this picture on my Facebook and within minutes had 20 likes. The power of flowers. Sometimes all it takes is one single flower to brighten a day.  Do you currently follow us on Social Media? We can be found on Facebook for our Princeton Page Here  and for our Yardley Page Here  or on Pinterest Here  or on Instagram Here . 

December is a fun month to be working here at the flower shop for multiple reasons but the main one is that our days are so varied. One day we might be making 34 cookie bouquets for a corporate client , like I'm doing below.  Or we may be making 24 Chocolate Sled Gift Baskets to be delivered to the Pavillions, like Alanna is working on below.   Or perhaps we making really pretty centerpieces for a holiday party, like Holly is doing below.   Not to mention hosting a design class where the students have fun and make new friends.   And at the end of the class the students pose with their creations!   Design Rosy makes boxwood tree after boxwood tree , all created by hand, one piece of foliage at a time and then decorated for the holiday.  Whatever we work on at the shop, including sympathy designs to show love to grieving families, our days in December are extremely varied and rewarding. While others might be slowing down at work, we are just gearing up

It's time for me to come clean. Red is my least favorite color (see Red or White Poinsettia Blog from earlier this week) but I do love poinsettias, so I look forward to them every year. But look what I found to sell in the store this year? Blue Poinsettias! Yes, they are tinted blue but aren't they super cute?  As you may or may not know, my favorite color is blue (see some of our marketing material pictured below) so when my poinsettia supplier had these available. I could not resist. Weight in... do you like Blue Poinsettias? Would you want to receive one this holiday season? 

Who says the only place to get cheap (low cost) flowers is at the Supermarket? Not us! Each week we offer two different flower specials. Monday's FreshTen are bouquets of unique blooms, the kinds you won't find at any Big Box Store for only $10. Ours are way fresher too with flowers arriving 3-5 times per week. Available at our Princeton store only we've featured flowers such as Mini Calla Lilies, Protea, Kale and other unique, long lasting flowers for FreshTen. This past week we offered Mini Calla lilies! Each Friday at both of our Stores (Princeton and Yardley) we offer $5 Friday Flowers ; a fresh bouquet usually valued at $10, $15 or more dollars for only $5. This past week we offered Freesia and Rose Bouquets. Do you currently follow us on Facebook? Just visit our pages each week to find out the flower specials! Click here for Princeton's Page or here for Yardley's Page . These bouquets often sell out so we make it easy to reserve. Just give us

Not here! Wow - in order to meet customer demand big box stores and mega online retail websites are offering same day, expedited delivery in big cities and, in the future, deliveries within an hour. We've even heard stories about futuristic drones flying over head and dropping off packages at our front door!   Being in the floral delivery business my company should consider this type of exceptional service - oh wait, we already do!  Yes, the floral industry has been offering same day, expedited delivery since the beginning, long before any of the "revolutionary" online retailers or the Internet even existed. In fact, florist have been delivering flowers within hours of the customer placing their order, long before most of the managers of the online company's were born - funny, but I'm serious. This special level of service has differentiated the floral industry from all other gift giving businesses for decades.  Within a few hours of the customer calling

Owning and managing a flower shop is not always about being around gorgeous flowers. Take this photo for instance, my adorable and hard working business partner/husband Kevin was hard at work this weekend re-flooring our retail cooler. Keeping the store fresh, clean and organized is so important to any retail business but I admit that I'm more particular than most.  In addition to the new floor, the designers now have new counters in the production room, the carpets are getting cleaned and we'll be painting a few walls.  Floral related we have decided to now organize our coolers by color rather than by variety. We are hoping this will make it easier on customers who are drawn to certain colors.  The next time you in the area of our Princeton Forrestal Village location, we hope you'd stop in for a visit! www.sendingsmiles.com  

The designers were especially creative this week! Love the pairing of this vase and graceful orchid designed by Alanna.  Designer Holly went hog wild with the brightly colored flowers filling the cooler with arrangements for our walk in customers at the Princeton store.   It's always a treat to bring in a case of fresh cut phaleanopsis orchids like these. They are a dream to design with.   Our designer had fun playing with these colorful blooms. Don't you love the silk flowers in the base of the vase? This would be the perfect floral arrangement to send to a little girl for her birthday !   We also had fun creating this Pave style design. Don't you love the way she layered the colors. We especially love the playful grasses dancing over the arrangement !  Which one was your favorite? We'd love to know!! 

This past week had out designers hard at work creating amazing one of a kind floral designs! Which one is your favorite?  Someone was going to be surprised when this colorful designed arrived for her Anniversary .  The color purple is so dramatic. We especially loved the combination of these roses, hydrangeas, alstroemeria, asters and lily grass.   This fun design was styled to look like a gift package. The bright and vibrant colors were perfect for a birthday .   A corporate client asked us to create happy centerpieces for an event they were having. Needless to say, they were thrilled with these!   This tight and compact design was both modern but natural. The pops of hot pink spray roses along with the orange and yellow tea roses, purple statice and lavender stock made for such a pretty desk top design.   For someone feeling a bit tropical, this one sided high style design held a little secret. In the center sat a little bird perched on some lily grass.