Market Manila

Here are some photos of the flowers from The Kid’s Confirmation. I very rarely volunteer to do large-ish public events like this, but if The Kid is involved, the “it’s a once in a lifetime event” logic kicks in. But I am getting wiser in my old age and once I had acquired the raw materials, a living room full of flowers and assorted materiel, I spent just 2 hours or so in the wee hours of the morning making the actual arrangements so that they could be at the church by 8:30 a.m. There were 10 “pieces” for the event, a large arrangement at the foot of the altar, pictured up top. This arrangement was placed inside a very large copper fish poacher that is roughly 2.5+ feet in length. The arrangement had some 8 ornamental cabbages, roughly 20+ heads of milflores or hydrangeas, deep pink roses and a few snapdragons. It took less than 15 minutes to put together as I had already set up the base with oasis the night before. I thought it was a bit intense… But you could see it from halfway back it the church, despite its relatively small size against a stunningly overdone gold painted altar as the background…

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Marketman is utterly crazed at the moment, so you will have to excuse me for a day or two while I prepare for The Kid’s confirmation this weekend. I volunteered (?!) to do the flowers for the church for the confirmation ceremony of roughly 2 dozen ladies and gentlemen, or is it still girls and boys? I only volunteer to do these things once a year or so and I am always utterly crazed the day before. While I have learned some tricks along the way, such as avoiding highly labor intensive tasks like having to de-thorn 3,000 roses and arrange them carefully, opting instead for larger blooms that are more visible and less work, the logistics of these types of events are always daunting. And with a limited budget chipped in by all of the parents of the kids, and Marketman’s innate gene for going just a little over the top, the challenge is always a good one. Several readers have asked me to do a post on ornamental cabbages so here are a few photos. Ornamental cabbages are not the same as cabbage roses (the later a very lush and heavily petaled flower, the former a close relative of cabbage, as in cole slaw). King Louis farms seems to be growing these up North, so they are plentiful, beautiful and well-priced as well. If you could see our home at the moment, it is EXPLODING with more raw materials than a typical florist would buy in a week, and here is a sampling…

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We sometimes bring several bunches of cut flowers to the beach, particularly if we are staying 4 or 5 days to a week, and have several house guests. Lisianthus are a favorite as they are abundant, lush, come in several pleasing colors, reasonably priced and tend to last several days despite the heat… However, after 3-4 days, some of the flowers tend to look bedraggled and wilted, and rather than chucking out the blooms, I find that “recycling” the flowers into a much smaller, tighter arrangement extends their life another 2-3 days…

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There always seems to be an abundance of fresh flowers for sale in Cebu City. Roses there seem more like the hobbyist’s garden varieties, rather than the commercially grown (heartless or is it soul-less) ones more common in Manila. Cebu roses open more fully, come in a spectacular range of colors, and they actually smell like roses. And they are almost always so incredibly well priced. For some reason the yellow roses here are just spectacular, albeit on the small side, but a vase filled with say 4-5 dozen of them never fails to lift spirits. In the past couple of decades, however, chrysanthemums seem to have become the most popular choice, probably because they are so hardy and reliable. Chrysanthemums have always struck me as being wake or funeral flowers, particularly the yellow or white ones, but they have somehow (together with their more colorful cousins) crept into the local ornamental cut flower scene… including weddings!, and I have always wondered where and how they were grown…

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I was very amused with the results of my Valentine’s Poll so far. I didn’t think I would get such a wide mix of responses when readers were asked what they REALLY wanted to get for Valentine’s Day, if anything. Somehow, I wasn’t surprised with a massage topping the wish list. One of the best material presents I have ever received is a portable, foldable professional massage table from Hammacher Schlemmer, it is wonderful. So I get the massage wish. The second most popular request was Marketman’s mangosteen jam. Hahaha. You are all such kind hearts. Flattery will get you everywhere, so more on the jam in the next post. Red roses came a relatively weak third, obviously a cliche, but really, I think it’s more that florists have really taken advantage of consumers and charge exhorbitant prices for flowers during Valentine’s Day… besides, I personally think in this day and age it might be more appropriate to give a living rose bush than cut flowers… but you can’t carry it so easily on a date… I’m glad chocolate ranked fourth, and I see many still wish for an equally outrageously priced Valentine’s night meal…

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Our household usually gears up early for the holidays. But this year we have been more than a bit sluggish. I lulled myself into believing things were under control because I bottled over 200 jars of homemade jam, our main giveaway for friends and family this year. And all of our “bulk” gift shopping, those intended for sukis at the markets, service personnel from nurses to village guards and car repairmen, is usually done in one or two Divisoria runs well before November; but I haven’t really done a trip yet. Then the Marketmanila t-shirt and tote program took far more time and effort than I could ever have imagined (and is still on-going), but I can tell it will yield phenomenal positive Christmas cheer… We didn’t even manage a Thanksgiving meal this year, an American tradition, but something I like to do even in Manila, because it sort of signals that “the starting gun has been fired” for the Christmas holidays. So Christmas preparations seemed on hold, on the back burner. That is, until the arrival of this wonderful fresh Christmas tree from S&R. Picking up a fresh tree roughly 4.5 weeks before Christmas is a bit bizarre, but it was now or no fresh tree. This tree is wonderful, particularly considering we are halfway around the planet from where it was raised. Much better than the trees the old S&R Management used to bring in. This is a full 8 feet, nicely shaped and surprisingly VERY fresh despite the long sea crossing from Oregon. I am skeptical that it will make it all the way to Christmas Day, but for the moment, our living room is filled with the most amazing natural pine fragrance.

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Milflores or Hydrangeas have been featured often on this blog before. In the past few years, growers have propagated more localized (smaller bloom) strains of this wonderful plant. In addition, King Louis Farms from the North (Bulacan and Baguio) and Puentespina Farms from the South (Davao) have also raised beautiful large hybrid varieties for commercial sale. The latter versions have large blooms and most often in blues, purples and pinks. While many consider hydrangeas a fickle cut flower due to its propensity to wilt and (apparently) die quickly when cut, I still count these flowers as one of the house favorites. They have robust blooms, fill a room with color and are relatively economical compared to other cut flowers. A few stems of hydrangeas can fill a medium sized vase and if cared for properly, last up 6-7 days in our warm weather…

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I was trying to avoid buying too much food last Saturday at the market so I spent some time in the plant and flower section of the FTI Taguig market instead. I figured that buying some flowers would be kinder to my fat cells. I have written about milflores before here, and I am particularly fond of this other post here, and I would have to say they are one of my favorite flowers simply because they are so abundant and with just three large blooms they easily fill a large vase. Many folks say they are incredibly fickle, but I think they are worth the trouble. Here are some tips for keeping them in good shape longer… First, if you buy potted milflores plants with the intention of cutting them, make sure you drown the soil in the pot first for at least 2-3 hours before you intend to cut them. It’s best to cut them in the early evening or early morning, then remove any excess leaves and plunge them into a vase with cool water, preferable with plant food, but if you don’t have that, with a drop or two of clorox to ward off bacteria growth. Keep these in a cool place, devoid of heavy draughts of air.

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