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Annie Adams is the author of The Final
Arrangement, book one in The Flower Shop Mystery series. When
not writing she can be found teaching workshops to authors about the business
of being a writer, or arranging flowers and delivering them in her own Zombie
Delivery Van. Today Annie visits us to discuss using flowers to decorate your
home. Learn more about Annie at her website.
Annie is offering either a paperback or e-copy of The Final
Arrangement to one of
our readers who posts a comment. Please make sure you either leave an email
address with your comment or check back on Sunday to see if you’re the winner.
We can’t get your book to you if we have no way of contacting you. -- AP
The Final Arrangement is the first in The Flower Shop Mystery Series,
where you will find our heroine, Quincy McKay working away in her flower shop.
Following are some things she would like to pass on about using flowers in your
home.
Flowers
are beautiful, they smell nice, and they are used to mark special occasions.
Too expensive to keep around the house…right?
Wrong!
Even
a single bloom has the power to make an emotional impact in your life as soon
as you see it, not to mention what the aroma can do to balance hormones and
improve your overall well being. And, a single flower can cost as little as a
dollar or two.
Did
you know it’s been proven flowers have an impact on your emotions? At Rutgers
University, a team of researchers performed a 10-month study of responses of
research participants to receiving flowers. They found the following:
1. Flowers
have an immediate impact on happiness. All study participants expressed
"true" or "excited" smiles upon receiving flowers,
demonstrating extraordinary delight and gratitude. This reaction was universal,
occurring in all age groups.
2. Flowers
have a long-term positive effect on moods. Specifically, study participants
reported feeling less depressed, anxious and agitated after receiving flowers,
and demonstrated a higher sense of enjoyment and life satisfaction.
3. Flowers
make intimate connections. The presence of flowers led to increased contact
with family and friends.
I
always recommend visiting your local florist to find out what’s in season and
to see some fantastic ideas for what you can do with flowers. There are several
economical and long lasting blooms such as alstromeria, carnations and
chrysanthemums that come in hot, vibrant colors sure to warm up a gloomy winter
room.
Carnations
and mums were once the lowly forgotten flowers of design, but they’ve made a
big-time comeback in party design at places like the Oscars, Oprah’s parties,
and more.
Besides
using longer-lasting varieties, there are tricks to extending the life of
flowers. Make sure you keep the water clean by changing it daily. If you
receive a packet of flower food with your purchase, it is imperative you read
the directions on the back of the packet and follow the measurements to the
letter. Studies have shown that dosing flower food improperly can actually be
worse for the flowers than not using any food at all. So keep the home remedies
like sugar, soda pop, aspirin, pennies and whatever else you may have heard of,
out of the vase.
Give
the stems a fresh cut just before placing them in clean water. Lastly, keep
your flowers cool. This is the most important step in my opinion. Optimal
temperature for flowers is generally 38-42 degrees Fahrenheit. Most of us don't
have a flower cooler in our homes, so the next best place is a cool area in the
house.
It only takes one flower to lift
your mood and stave off the effects of depression, so stop and pick up an
affordable bouquet, even if it’s from the local grocery store. Flowers are
calorie-free, drug-free and guilt-free sources of happiness that don't have to
break the bank.
Blurb:
The
Vulture is dead.
The
body of Quincy McKay’s nemesis and biggest competitor in the floral business
has just been discovered in a casket at the mortuary, complete with flowers on
the lid.
Derrick
Gibbons, aka The Vulture, stole all of Quincy’s funeral business, and now she’s
on a mission to get it back. But there’s a problem—Quincy is now the main
suspect in The Vulture’s murder.
Armed
with only her Zombie delivery van, good intentions, and the business card of a
handsome cop named Alex, she must find the killer, save the flower shop, and
keep from ending up in the next casket. If she can dodge burning bushes, the
plague of a polygamist ex, and her mother's Mormon Mafia Spy Network, her life
with Alex and her shop could become the perfect arrangement.
