The Therapeutic Process of Flower Arrangement

Who knew flower arrangement could be so therapeutic?
Oh wait, you did?
OK, so, I didn't know before, but I'm like a changed woman now. Not that I didn't love flowers before; back in PJ, I used to buy a small bouquet of fresh flowers whenever I ran my errands and would place them in my single vase, next to my favourite armchair.

However I don't currently buy fresh flowers for a few reasons, the first being where the heck am I going to get a regular supply of pretty fresh flowers in this town (and I'm not the sort of person who'd go out regularly to buy some even if they were available), and the second is I have a fear of accidentally purchasing a flower that's toxic to my cats, which I chalk up to reading too many cautionary tales of people accidentally exposing their cats to toxic items without knowing it.
And third, um, fresh flowers are dang expensive, peeps. For now, I'll just settle with admiring (and envying) the fresh flowers in other people's houses.

So it's all artificial florals now for me which is of course nowhere near as good as the real thayng — and admittedly nowhere near as green — but I put great care into storing my faux flowers and leaves so I know they'll last me for a long time. Plus, with me being such an introverted hermit who needs some form of occasional escapism, the quiet act of arranging flowers and the satisfying results from it has been beneficial to my mental health.

I have no real flower arrangement skills whatsoever but I found that that does not stop me from enjoying flower arrangement. What I do is I try out different combinations of flowers and/or leaves in each of my little vases, then I try to play around with the height of each stem to create some depth as having them all be at the same height could look a little flat (I bend and unbend the wires, but thankfully they're all holding up pretty well). I then decide where to scatter the vases around my house, concentrating at the areas I hang out in the most.

I take my own sweet time doing it all as I find this organizing process rather enjoyable and, yes, therapeutic, so I even make a day out of it.

I love searching for pictures of flower arrangements online just to seek out inspirations. I sigh at those big gorgeous colourful arrangement of flowers but my heart just flutters when I see a beautiful Ikebana arrangement; even seeing a simple vase filled with artfully arranged two plain stalks of leaves has the uplifting yet calming effect I crave to gaze at, being inside the house all day long.
But really, anything goes when it comes to flower arrangement for me — I want them all!