How many of you buy fresh cut flowers?

Burp_2

We try to be as money saving as possible but allow ourselves a treat every week or so

For my other half its a car magazine and for me its a bunch of flowers from the supermarket (under £5)

They make me happy brigtening up the living room but I cant help but have a niggling feeling in my head that its a frivilous expense

I know I can do pot plants that last longer but I just love fresh cut flowers ... so how many of you MSE'ers buy fresh cut flowers but try to money save at the same time?

Burp x

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meritaten

I buy fresh cut flowers from time to time, about every couple of months I suppose. funny this should come up now as I bought some stunning chrysanthemums from Aldis on Monday! they are gorgeous, sort of brown and yellow spiky heads and only £1.79 per bunch! I had two bunches and they are in this old vase I have - which is in the EXACT same colours!!! even the bits of green in the vase are the same dark green as the chrysanths leaves! it looks stunning and well worth the money- has already given me so much pleasure for less than a fiver!

Is it frivolous? hey, I shop at Aldis mostly and we eat like royalty in my opinion - I just cannot do a weekly shop at MR Ts or Adsas now as to get the same amount of stuff I have to spend thirty pounds more! so a bunch of flowers every couple of months is the least I deserve! actually OH wouldnt mind a bit if I bought flowers EVERY week! he recognises the savings we make and one thing he isnt is mean!

Sweet_Pea_2

Just typed a long post and lost it - doh!

I love flowers too, I do feel guilty buying them though even though I can afford a bunch now and again. My lovely mum bought me a bunch of tulips from Aldi today (only £1.89) and they are lovely - get loads of pleasure from them brightening up my room. As much pleasure as the posh bunch OH bought me for Valentines - they are pretty whatever they cost.

I don't buy daffs though although I like them because they don't last long enough, so instead I planted up loads of mini bulbs in pots and they are all flowering now and last longer.

Billie-jo

We buy fresh flowers most weeks, one week they are taken up to the cemetary for our daughter and the other week they are for in the house. We alternate the weeks so that others can take their flowers the week we dont. Howevever if we go up (at least twice a week)and there are no flowers I would nip and get a bunch as to me theres nothing worse than a wilted dead bunch of flowers on a loved ones grave.
We are trying to be money saving as well and spend between £4 -£5 a week on them. We have a local green grocers which do 2 smallish bunches for £5 and often find that Morri$on$ have some reasonably priced.

Doesnt matter how healthy a pot plant is, its hours are numbered when I get it and they rarely last 2 days!!!!!

If you can afford them and they brighten your day dont feel guilty just enjoy them.

rinabean

I don't. I recommend you get a plant that flowers often instead. I have a beautiful orchid that I got from ikea for my birthday a few years ago. It's a purple dendrobium with lots of tiny flowers. It grows like a spider plant! It's always overflowing with babies that I have to give away because I live in a tiny flat and I have limited plant room! The babies start flowering after only a few months, and they flower on the parent too! And the smell is beautiful, like the sweetest honey. Between the few that I have, the room is rarely without flowers, and they're so easy to care for, too.

Even if you manage to kill it (really, they are the easiest orchids, all you have to do is put them in a glass vase with rocks at the bottom, water whenever you remember and the waterline is low, fertilise a few times a year and they will overtake your house - I'm not very green-thumbed, I have some other phalaenopsis-type orchids of which only 1 of 3 is not slowly dying on me), at 3.99 a pop they're still cheap to just buy and replace!

If you can keep it alive, it's a nicer feeling than watching cut flowers wither and die, don't you think? That's why I'm a plant-person and not a flower-person, I think.

slowlyfading

I love fresh flowers, but don't tend to buy them often. they seem more of a treat that way

Sublime_2

I tend to buy them when on special offer. I haven't bought for a long while though, due to having most of my vases getting left behind when I moved house.

I will get that rectified though soon, as makes the house cheery! :cool:

Aarons_mummy

My house is too small for flowers, with a toddler running around I just have no-where safe to put them

Plus I would have to buy them myself which I don't want to do lol!

Kevie192

rinabean your orchid sounds gorgeous! Do you know if I can buy them online anywhere? I'm about 120 miles away from the nearest Ikea

Kevin x

rinabean

Kevie192 wrote: »

rinabean your orchid sounds gorgeous! Do you know if I can buy them online anywhere? I'm about 120 miles away from the nearest Ikea

Kevin x

I have lost the sticker on the original pot but I'm quite sure my plant is "Berry Oda" - this is the one here http://www.easyorchids.co.uk/shop/Dendrobium-Berry-Oda.html - but it's 16 quid and sold out! I'll keep looking!

Edit: Here's one in stock - http://raycreekorchids.com/catalog/product_info.php/manufacturers_id/10/products_id/38?osCsid=qf3oeu907etldqnclbpikuuei4 - but it's still waaaay more than mine was. I hope these are all good-quality plants and they're just covering their backs with all the "minimum temperature 13C" nonsense, I'm OS, my house isn't that warm in winter XD

lostinrates

I too feel a bit envious of the orchid. I kept orchids as a student but have not since then....

I do sometimes buy cut flowers. BUT only when we have people coming and because we have no garden here yet. One room has a load of geraniums on the sill and an abutalon, and now we have little glasses of snowdrops in the bedroom. We had pot grown narcissi last month, but I have a vase of cheap roses in my sitting room (I often buy whoopsied flowers, and put the freshest of them in a big vase and those that only have a couple of days left in a vase somewhere else.)

In summer, as the garden takes off, i will be stuff from there....bringing the outside in.

I've tried and tried with potted jasmines, but they always die on me.

edit: I did get some beries on their twigs to last over a month in late autumn, from the garden, which I thought was impressive....made a lovely display and were free:)