Over the Garden Fence: How a homemade nosegay became the heart of an alumni celebration

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3 hours ago

The most recent venture over the garden fence sent me to was a friend's home where roses were blooming. Terri and Randy Lady still do justice to growing this queen of flowers.
The plan was to construct a nosegay with a center of pink. Randy spoke with me about the health and size of the roses, claiming the soil was marvelous. The miniature roses were larger than what is typical.
He cut four deep pink roses and a few stems of The Fairy a polyantha rose that blooms in clusters nearly all summer. The roses were refrigerated.
That evening leaves from heuchera, gray-green Lamb's Ears and several ferns were cut. Coral bells, penstemon, and fever few were gathered. They went into water to be conditioned.
A standard posey holder with a handle had been inverted into water to soak a half circle of floral foam. To assemble, the holder was placed in a heavy mug. Starting at the bottom of the wet half sphere, stems on the leaves of the Lamb's ears were cut on a diagonal and pushed into the foam.
Penstemon stems with white blooms were placed on top of the gray-green. Tips of fern were inserted with spaces.
The soft pink stems of The Fairy rose were higher on the half sphere. Pieces of the tiny, daisy-like, white fever few were next. The pink central focus roses were tucked in. Last but not least tips of pink coral bells were placed randomly for a top dressing much like baby's breath might be used.
Earlier in the day an 18-inch length of cotton eyelet had been gathered into a circle. This was held against the bottom of the posey holder with hot glue.. Four types of pink ribbon in differing lengths were tied all together. Then each strand ending was knotted. One gob of hot glue kept the ribbon cluster to one edge of the eyelet.
Why all this? Heidelberg University's alumni weekend, which was celebrating 175 years of the college's history, included a wedding vow renewal ceremony. The spirit of it all swept me up to the point a white sport coat was rented for Bill. His pink carnation was backed with a couple of heuchera leaves; all were bound with tape. A cotton eyelet dress arrived for me. The nose gay, also called a tussy mussy, would serve as a bouquet substitute.
Flowers were laid into bubble packaging with a bag of ice below. The unit went down into a box. Four hours later we were in line with about 30 other couples all wondering how this would unfold. We promenaded into a circular walkway outside the Honors House. Led by the vice president of Alumni Affairs, who is an ordained minister, we repeated (after her) a brief version of our vows. Couples pinned one another with a double heart pin.
As we were leaving the minister called out asking me to come back and toss the bouquet nosegay. The woman who caught it was over 85 and had never been married. She was there as a guest of her sister. Through tears she asked if she could keep it.
Of course she took the flowers home. That nosegay brought joy to another.
Life is good.
Mary Lee Minor is a member of the Earth, Wind and Flowers Garden Club, an accredited master gardener, a flower show judge for the Ohio Association of Garden Clubs and a former sixth grade teacher.
This article originally appeared on Bucyrus Telegraph-Forum: Nosegay was hit of the party at Heidelbert University reunion