>> J Schwanke's Life in Bloom is brought to you by the following.

♪♪ >> At home.

At work.

Or anytime.

Cal flowers is a proud sponsor of "J Schwanke's Life in Bloom," where flowers and wellness go hand in hand.

>> We have fresh in all our stores, from soups and steaks and all things flour to all things flowering.

Custom fresh arrangements designed by our in-store florists at Albertsons Companies.

>> With additional support from the following.

Passion Roses.

Suntory Flowers.

>> Flowers beautify spaces large and small.

In this episode, from a city flower installation to your porch or deck areas, to personal spaces to help inspire you and even to your plate with Chef Trimell Hawkins.

♪♪ ♪♪ >> I'm J Schwanke.

welcome to "Life in Bloom."

"Wherever it may grow, No matter where you go, A flower is a lovesome thing."

Flowers create wherever you find them.

It's undeniable.

And it's scientifically proven that flowers improve your mood and encourage more positive feelings.

Whether on a large scale, such as a city installation or special event, or on a very personal level, in your own space.

Flowers beautify surroundings every day.

Being out in nature or visiting a garden is a wonderful way to lift the spirit, and these good feelings can be further amplified when including flowers in your own personal spaces.

Today, I'll show you several ways to beautify your life and reap the rewards of the happy feelings flowers ignite.

♪♪ >> I love to see events that make a difference utilizing the power of flowers.

Recently in Santa Barbara, California, Petals of Appreciation, thousands of flowers were installed all over the city, engaging people in community spaces.

My friend Joost, owner of Florabundance, played a big role in these inspiring arrangements that beautified public spaces on a grand scale.

♪♪ >> Tell us what happens here at Florabundance.

>> All the flowers that we procure arrive here.

They get processed.

As you can see here, the ladies are going through different flowers.

They need to be bunched, re-bunched, checked on quality.

Then it goes in a staging cooler, gets checked into the big cooler.

But things that have been pre-sold for next week get pulled.

>> Debbie, this is a pull.

>> Yes.

>> And in our industry we talk about it as a pull.

So it's a colloquial term.

But for someone who is, uh, doesn't know anything about flowers, how would you describe what a pull is?

>> Usually it's based on a customer's request, on color palette, sometimes budget, based on what their event is.

They need a little bit of help 'cause we're their eyes and the experts of what we have in our cooler.

We carry a lot of really cool, different things that people don't know about.

>> Right.

>> So there's a lot of florists that don't know all the different flowers that we have, and we like to introduce them to new stuff, too.

And we're the ones who see what looks great.

♪♪ >> They give me a color palette and something to start with, and I start pulling them and sending them pictures and showing them different things that I have available to go with their event.

>> Image boards, too.

We've talked about those pictures that a bride may have pulled off of social media and said, "Oh, I want my cake to look like this.

I want the feel of the thing.

I like the colors of this."

And sometimes those things can be different.

♪♪ >> You're the amalgam... >> Yes.

>>...of all that together.

>> And they'll give me those pictures and they'll give me their inspirations and they'll say, "Okay, this is the general vibe.

Doesn't have to be those exact flowers, except for the things that I have requested.

So let's start there."

And then I get to build off of that with whatever looks great in the cooler.

♪♪ >> We're all color experts here.

We're very, very particular about our color and style.

We've come such a long way with texting and pictures being able to be on our phones.

You know, it's just been great.

>> Well, thank you so much.

Thank you for doing a pull for us.

>> You're welcome.

>> Thank you for showing us how it worked and sharing your expertise.

>> Sure.

♪♪ >> You have a thing called Petals of Appreciation.

Tell us a little bit about that.

>> So we wanted to in this flower valley here in Carpinteria and Ventura, Oxnard, we wanted to celebrate our 30th anniversary.

And I said, "It's nice to give a party," which we did, but I said, "Let's do something more than that.

Let's get the public involved and thank our growers who made this possible."

>> Great idea.

>> We had six designers that wanted to design, you know, bus stop.

>> Installation.

>> Outside on the streets.

I went to City Hall to ask if I needed permits.

And they go, "What are you doing?

Are you selling anything?"

I said, "No, we're just giving away flowers to the public."

And we had volunteers from the Dream Foundation help us.

That's our nonprofit, the young school kids, two per stop, giving flowers to the public.

It was a little tact to explain why flowers are so good for you, and make some people aware of what flowers are about, and why you should care about flowers and have flowers daily in your life.

>> Wow, you have a natural rotation of product because you want the freshest in here and that's what you're sending to your customers.

But you have some things that don't sell.

Yes.

And so you work with the Dream Foundation and they come by every week.

Tell us more about that.

>> We have flowers that are past their prime.

We cannot ship.

They didn't pass our inspection.

And instead of throwing them out, we give them to the Dream Foundation.

They are a volunteer, non-profit organization.

They have a great program called Flower Empower.

They have volunteers coming in, and they repurpose the flowers.

They make little arrangements or larger arrangements and they bring them to people who are in hospice, you know, care homes, nursing homes, facilities and, you know, by the rules and containers they can use.

And they've done that for, I think we've done that for 15 or 20 years.

>> That's an incredible investment in community and people's emotions.

You've always put flowers in the forefront of what you're doing, and we appreciate that so much as flower people.

>> Yeah.

>> But thank you for sharing Florabundance with us, and all the magical things you are making happen with flowers in your world.

♪♪ ♪♪ >> People often talk about my garden and I know it seems kind of incredible, but we set it up really well for you when we're filming "Life in Bloom."

And one of the noticeable things that we do is we drop pots of plants into the landscape to give it color and to give it interest.

It's also a really creative way to add color to something at certain times of year, too.

Right now we have the black-eyed Susans, but it's fun to drop in a mandevilla next to them.

A mandevilla like this is a wonderful plant that you can get and it'll be a nice little plant to start with, but I added the trellis simply by tying pieces of bamboo together with craft wire and placing it down inside here.

Mandevillas love to climb.

At the end of summer, I'll have something that's completely covered.

Both of these, the mandevilla and the Kauai, are extremely drought tolerant plants.

That's another thing.

Our climate has changed in Michigan, and it's difficult for me to find plants that really thrive in the hot, hot summers that we're getting now.

Not only are they heat tolerant, but they love the heat.

So humid, hot weather they are so happy and they're going to get lots of blooms.

But I also realized that you might live in an apartment, or maybe you have just a deck that you can work with.

Or maybe you live in a condominium where you have little options, so picking up a single plant and putting it on your porch is going to brighten that space for you.

I love the fact that a plant like this will grow all summer long.

I love that these come in different colors and some of them are very unique.

There's a mandevilla called Bluephoria that is a bluish coloration that's really interesting in the garden.

Also, if you have place for one or two plants, decide what they're going to look like and what colors you really enjoy.

If you like hot pink or you like a coral color, it's a great opportunity to choose the colors that make you excited or make you think of different things.

I always think back to Leatrice Eiseman and her book about colors for your every mood.

Each of us has our own color horoscope.

And so maybe if you're a very positive person, you want yellow flowers in your garden.

Or maybe if you're very traditional or classic, you want those blue colored flowers in your garden.

It's a great opportunity for us to take those flowers and drop them in.

Now, the other thing I love having in my garden is scented geranium.

And I like the citronella because A, it helps keep mosquitoes away, but also it's very helpful in flower arranging.

I grow a blue African basil, and I also grow the scented geranium so that I can utilize them in arrangements.

It's a wonderful way for me to think about cutting off a couple pieces of something, and being able to make them into an arrangement as well.

I love the smell of gardenias, and when we vacation in Florida, I see those gardenia bushes out there, and I've always been envious.

One of our viewers wrote in to me about gardenias and told me about a gardenia variety named Aimee that has big, beautiful blooms.

And I got myself my first bush of it and it's got buds starting.

So I'm hoping by the end of the summer I'm going to have nice big gardenias that I can bring inside, and I can allow those gardenias to maybe sit on the nightstand or at the kitchen sink where I can smell them.

Remember fragrance, color, durability.

Pick out the things that you like that are going to make your patio or your windowsill, your deck, or your garden a little more fun.

We typically have a featured flower on our show, and we look at one flower and we tell people about it.

But I thought since we had this amazing assortment here that you could tell us about what some of the hotter trending flowers are right now.

>> I think the number two flower right now is peonies.

We have them almost year round.

>> So you said number two.

What's number one?

>> Well, roses are still number one.

>> Okay, alright.

>> What's new in roses is there are a lot of new spray roses.

Garden spray roses.

This is a garden spray rose.

>> Wow.

>> Double flower.

Very, very popular.

>> And so spray rose means that instead of having one big bloom, we've got five, six, eight, ten.

All little ones on one stem.

>> One stem.

>> Any special color that's super popular in roses?

>> Well, the beige colors.

>> Oh, right.

>> The muted tones.

So those colors are still very popular.

But right now you talk to people who do weddings, they say, what are the colors?

They go like, well, bright colors to mixed colors.

>> Well, thanks for that quick tour.

I appreciate it so much.

♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ There's no reason not to enjoy flowers to enhance your mood, especially when it comes to personal spaces.

Getting a little tiny arrangement of maybe one or two flowers in spaces that are unexpected will help enhance our mood throughout the day.

Maybe it's a little vase next to your computer, or maybe there's one on the kitchen sink where you're doing the dishes.

Or perhaps there's one on the shaving stand.

I like that in the morning so that when I walk in to my bathroom, there's a little flower there, always ready to go.

And it doesn't have to be a lot of flowers.

It can be a tiny vase with a single bloom or two.

Let me show you some examples of some fun things that will help enhance our mood in little tiny spaces with just a few flowers.

So here.

This is a reclaimed bottle.

It actually had olive oil in it and I thought it was really cute.

So I took off the labels and I used it as a vessel for flowers.

And we really only need one flower in it.

Or maybe a couple of accent flowers with it, too.

We can drop a lily like this right down inside that base.

If we wanted to have an accent of tweedia, that's easy to do as well.

♪♪ ♪♪ I love the smell of garden roses, and having something that comes out of the garden is a wonderful way to enjoy a little vase like this.

It was actually a candle holder, and now I've converted it after the candles gone, to be a little vase.

♪♪ ♪♪ Two rose blossoms is a wonderful way to experience that fragrance.

Think about that.

Sitting next to where you're working.

You can pick up the flowers and smell them.

I love a little vase like this.

It was actually a candle, but it could be a shot glass.

Another great way is just to fill it with flowers and something like astrantia, that has little tiny laterals, we can create a little cluster of flowers just like that.

Cut the stems and drop them in there.

What a cute little accent.

And you can tuck it just about anywhere.

I like a single flower, and Gerbera daisies make us happy.

Just looking at that flower makes us delighted and puts a smile on our face.

We can tuck it inside a little bubble bowl like this.

And we've got a floating flower that can accompany us in a little tiny space.

This is one of my favorites.

It's a little container that looks like a head and it needs some hair.

And that hair can be flowers.

What's better than a flower head of hair with hydrangeas?

So, is your mind working?

Are you thinking of those little places you can tuck a few flowers to enhance your own mood?

our lives with flowers.

♪♪ I met Trimmell Hawkins at the West Michigan Home and Garden show.

>> Yeah.

>> And everybody was raving about you, and you were fixing food.

And it was exciting.

>> It was a fun event.

>>Tell us about Poetry on a Plate.

>> I've always loved cooking.

Well, growing up, I also loved poetry.

You know, I used to write poetry all the time, you know?

And I think there was an elegance to poetry, you know, that actually ended up converting to the way I plate, you know?

I believe that every plate, there's beauty in every dish and every color and every element, you know.

So everything I add to the plate has purpose, you know.

And that's kind of the same way with a poem.

You know, you don't just throw words in just because, right?

You know, and I mean, I feel the same way about food, you know.

When people really enjoy the plating aspect of what I do because I try to create art.

And I mean, poetry is art and food is art, and plating is, you know, is art.

You know, the plate's a canvas and the food is the words that go on the plate.

And I really do just love it.

>> So what are you gonna fix today?

>> We're gonna do some seared cod, you know, over a bed of rice, some split peas, some snap peas.

We're gonna do that with a coconut curry sauce.

And then we're gonna finish it with a grilled pineapple salsa, and it's gonna be a beautiful dish.

You know, it's gonna be, again, like, these beautiful, you know, arrangements that you make.

You know, it's going to be as colorful as that, hopefully, you know.

>> Oh, awesome.

I love it.

>> And just as beautiful.

♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ What we're going to do is we're going to start plating on this beautiful dish.

And normally, I would sauce less.

We're gonna do it the opposite this time.

>> Alright.

Okay.

>> So what we have is a beautiful coconut curry.

I'm going to get a good amount.

Don't be stingy with the sauce.

Now -- from there, we're gonna give this dish just a little bit of color, okay?

And we're gonna add some of these beautiful petals.

We want to spread those out.

These are edible flowers, you know, so you're gonna get a little bit of that herbaceous-ness.

A little bit of sweet from these petals, you know?

And it just adds a nice little element to the dish.

Now, from there, what we have is the beautiful cilantro lime rice.

We have some split peas.

We have some snow peas in there.

Go right in the middle with that.

And we want to mound that up.

Kind of create a pedestal.

That's what we're going to set the fish on.

Now, got this beautiful cod.

Got a really, really good sear on this right here.

>> Got gleam.

>> This was just a very, very simple pineapple salsa.

We grilled the pineapple to bring out some of the sweetness of it as we cut those onions julienne super, super thin.

So you can actually see through them.

Little bit of jalapeno lime juice.

But we want to add just this little punch of chili oil.

♪♪ Gonna top that, a little bit of some scallions.

You know what -- just because we got the flowers, we are going to make it beautiful.

There.

>> That's amazing.

Why take all this extra effort to present it?

You know what, people eat with their eyes first.

And that's a real thing, you know?

But the other reason why, you know, plating is important is because when you plate, you're plating for them to eat it a certain way, right?

Giving them the right amount of snap peas and the chili oil, the drizzle.

You know, while it does add to the aesthetics of the dish, every time they take a bite, they're getting something different, you know?

What I'm trying to do is I plate and as I build, you know, these recipes and I build a plate is I'm trying to take a person on a journey.

So every time you jump in there, you get something, you're gonna taste it.

Oh, that was a little bit sweet.

Oh, that was, I had a little bit of heat.

Oh, I got the snap of the snap peas.

Oh, what was that?

I don't even know what that is, but I gotta try it again, right?

It really does make the dish exciting.

>> Absolutely.

And it's like an arrangement.

If you just have a vase of gladiolas, it's a vase of gladiolas.

>> Yeah.

>> You know, but if you add a little bit of astrantia or a little bit of tweedia or there's an artichoke tucked in the middle of it -- >> I see it.

>> You know.

It's that same.

I knew I was going to learn from you, because I think I need to think about that, that dish, as being an arrangement.

>> Absolutely.

I mean, it is.

It really is.

I mean... >> You've got focal area, you've got texture, you've got -- and then you're going to combine it with how great it tastes.

>> Absolutely.

>> So, Chef, let's try this.

>> All right I'll let you dig in first.

And I'm right behind you.

>> Where should I go?

Should I go here?

>> That corner.

>> That looks really good.

It has good caramelization on the fish.

>> Okay.

>> You're able to get the rice, the sauce.

>> That's the perfect bite right there.

>> There we go.

>> Let me see.

>> It's so good.

♪♪ It's so good.

>> I'm making a mess, but it is good.

>> It's so good.

All right, my friend, thank you so much for coming.

>> Thank you for having me.

It's a pleasure.

I knew when I met you, I thought, this is a guy -- this is a guy I need to know and a guy I needed to invite.

So thank you for teaching us about poetry on a plate.

And now it's time for my favorite part of the show.

"Flowers From You," the viewers.

This week, I'm sharing arrangements from two different viewers in West Michigan who watch the show on WGVU.

The first is from Fred and Michelle Davison.

Fred writes, "Michelle was watching your program this weekend and you inspired her to do this arrangement, using the glass balls as her frog to hold the flowers.

Thank you for all your suggestions and wonderful shows."

This is gorgeous, Fred and Michelle.

You are definitely a flower power couple.

I also have dried arrangements created by dried flower artist Dee Hollemans, sent in by her husband, Bernie Hollemans.

Bernie shares, "Dee shows her dried flower art at our farmers market in Holland, Michigan.

When kept out of the direct sun, they last five years or longer."

This is terrific, Bernie.

Thank you for sharing Dee's amazing talents.

These dried flower creations are exquisite.

Please send me your pictures of flower arrangements inspired by "Life in Bloom."

We call them "Schwankes" after our viewers nickname.

Send them to J@uBloom.com That's the letter J @ the letter U Bloom.com and watch for more Schwankes on upcoming shows.

Thank you for watching J. Schwanke's "Life in Bloom."

Remember that flowers have a way of conveying beauty not only through our senses of sight and smell.

Flowers also enhance our health, mood, and even speak to the beauty within each of us For "Life in Bloom," I'm J Schwanke.

>> I've always said that cooking is one of those things that's probably one of the most vulnerable things that you can ever do.

We want to please everybody, but we also know that we can't, you know, so you have to look at it and you have to take it with a grain of salt, you know, and you have to have some thick skin because, because people are going to let you know.

>> What my hardest thing was when I would hand someone their bride's bouquet.

And I became very good at it.

They would almost always cry.

And I didn't know if that was good or bad.

And I was kind of like, okay, I've made this bouquet, and I think I did it the way you wanted it.

And you're and they're like, "It's so beautiful."

And I'm like, oh, good, okay.

I never had a bride throw one at me or anything.

So that's good.

>> That's a good thing.

>> Yeah.

Yeah.

And so I understand.

I understand that.

J Schwanke's "Life in Bloom" is filmed in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

>> J's flower arranging tips, helpful hints, and arrangement recipes are available in J's two books, "Fun with Flowers" for $25 and "Bloom 365" for $20 plus shipping.

To purchase these books and any of our additional products, visit uBloom.com/Store To learn more about flower arranging and J, access to videos, and to get recipes, tips, techniques, and much more, visit us online at uBloom.com Follow Jay on Facebook and Instagram at J Schwanke's "Life in Bloom."

J Schwanke's "Life in Bloom" is brought to you by the following.

♪♪ >> At home.

At work.

Or anytime.

Cal flowers is a proud sponsor of J Schwanke's "Life in Bloom," where flowers and wellness go hand in hand.

>> We have fresh in all our stores, from soups and steaks and all things flour to all things flowering.

Custom fresh arrangements designed by our in-store florists at Albertsons Companies.

>> With additional support from the following.

Passion Roses.

Suntory Flowers.

♪♪ Closed caption funding provided by fabulousflorals.com ♪♪