J Schwanke’s Life In Bloom

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

At home.

At work.

Or anytime.

CalFlowers 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... Dollar Tree.

Autumn is in the air on this special episode of "Life in Bloom."

The bounty of the season, from pumpkins to ears of stained-glass corn to chrysanthemums, and even roses crafted from colorful leaves all play a part in these inviting flower arrangements.

Plus, an autumn tablescape and a tempting cocktail to celebrate the season.

I'm J Schwanke.

Welcome to "Life in Bloom."

Although I do love every season, fall is my favorite time of year.

Here in Michigan, nature puts on colorful displays, and the plentiful farms across the region are bringing in their harvest for all to enjoy.

Chrysanthemums provide beautiful colors for autumn.

And, of course, pumpkins and gourd inspire creative displays through November.

The bounty of the season also serves as a reminder to offer gratitude, not just this time of year but every day, as well.

I find that taking a moment to consider and give thanks for the blessings in life -- including flowers, of course -- is a simple but powerful technique for self-care.

I hope you enjoy these ideas for celebrating autumn and are inspired to take a moment to express gratitude daily for your own well-being.

So, a pumpkin arrangement doesn't necessarily have to be a Halloween arrangement.

Here we're gonna use one of these beautiful, green Cinderella pumpkins.

These pumpkins are super hard to carve out.

I've tried to carve them out before, and they're very meaty inside and super tough to get through with a knife.

So instead, we'll arrange our foam on top and make our arrangement on top of the pumpkin.

The great part about that is, the pumpkin's gonna last a long time because it hasn't been carved out, and our arrangement will last a long time, too.

We'll start with half a block of floral foam that's been soaked in flower nutrient water.

Then, we'll bevel the sides and the top.

This makes a rounder form for making a more cohesive arrangement.

I'll set that right on top of the pumpkin, and that's where it'll sit.

The stem helps hold it in place.

I'll add a collar of skeletonized umbrella grass.

I like the way that it gives it a spooky effect, and we're adding pieces all the way around the foam.

The focal emphasis for this arrangement are two artichokes.

I bought those at the grocery store.

I'll cut them at an angle and place them directly into the flower foam.

Pine-cone leucadendron has a nice light-green color, and it also gives us vertical texture in the arrangement.

Then I add two kinds of millet.

I have an upright and the regular millet with the leaves that we're used to seeing in the fall.

I cover my foam with Green Ball dianthus, and I'll fill in with scabiosa pods.

All the different textures that go together in this arrangement are what make it interesting, and the tints, tones, and shades of green.

This beautiful pumpkin is the perfect base for this wonderful arrangement.

So, you see, it doesn't have to be about a jack-o'-lantern with a pumpkin.

This is a wonderful transition that will last throughout the entire harvest season, all beautiful colors of green in a monochromatic textural display.

I'll show you how to open roses.

One of the things that we do a lot in the flower industry to get a rose to open more is to blow into it.

[ Blowing ] It gently encourages spaces between the petals so that it opens up more.

Another method a friend taught me was to take the rose and spin it between your hands like this.

That's a little more rough on the rose, but you'll also notice how it encourages the rose to open up more.

Two ways you can open up your rose more when you need to hurry it along a little bit.

We'll be creating an arrangement for every day.

That's a great way to think about flowers, not just for weddings and events but for every day.

The health benefits of having beautiful flowers around all the time is beneficial to our minds, our bodies, and our souls.

So let's get started with this beautiful fall arrangement.

I filled the container with two blocks of foam.

I've cut them so that there's plenty of room for water all the way around the outside.

This arrangement's gonna have a lot of roses in it, and roses are heavy drinkers, so I want to make sure there's a good reservoir of flower nutrient water.

We'll start by creating a collar and defining the shape of the arrangement using the autumn leaves.

These are preserved oak leaves, but you could also use one from trees in your yard.

Next, I'll add some textural items -- seeded eucalyptus, scabiosa, poppy pods, and a few hydrangeas.

Then it's time for the stars of the arrangement -- our beautiful roses.

The foam allows me to make precision placements, so I can place some of the roses deeper and other ones taller.

This helps create depth in the arrangement.

Even though everything's close together, there's a lot of different surfaces and a lot of different textures.

Varying them all so it isn't a smooth ball makes it more interesting to look at.

I'll even add a succulent.

I've placed it on a stake and will add it to add texture and color to this beautiful autumn arrangement.

I'll keep adding roses and textural elements until it's complete.

This is beautiful, if I do say so myself.

One of the things I talk about is, when we arrange things, if we start with pretty flowers first, we always have success.

And this beautiful autumn arrangement is certainly all about the flowers.

I truly love autumn, and I love creating a tablescape like this where I can use fresh flowers and foliage, pumpkins, gourds, even hedge apples.

And one of my favorite projects when it gets to be fall and the colors start to turn in the tree are these beautiful autumn-leaf roses.

They're created out of maple leaves.

Let me show you how I can create a rose out of autumn leaves.

For this project, pick the leaves off the maple tree so that they are ultra fresh rather than waiting for them to fall.

Start with a large leaf and fold the top half down to form a crease.

Then, roll the leaf up to form a coil along the folded edge.

Secure the leaf in place with craft-covered wire.

This is ideal because it's gentle and will hold the leaf secure without tearing through it.

Fold another leaf and add it around the first coil to make it more dense.

Use one continuous length of wire for the entire rose.

Then, add leaves around the center of the leaf rose, scrunching them around the center while securing them into place with the wire.

Continue to add leaves all the way around in layers to form and create the rose as large as you would like.

To finish, wrap the craft-covered wire around the stems and continue down to a diminishing point at the end.

This creates a decorative stem on the leaf rose.

Now the leaf rose is ready for display.

They dry naturally and will provide many days of enjoyment.

It's always fun to create a tablescape.

And, first, we decide where we're gonna put it.

I always like to have lots of elements inside my tablescape, especially when it's for fall.

Start by placing several yards of two kinds of ribbon on the table.

I like it to cascade at both ends.

Wired-edge ribbon stands up nicely and creates fun loops.

Add coordinating vases of autumn flowers and fall foliage at different heights down the center of the table.

It's fun to add a large item in the center of the table.

I chose a yellow heirloom pumpkin.

You can carve them like I did or make a jack-o'-lantern or use different sizes and shapes.

This is where your own creativity comes into play.

Then, add the leaf roses.

I love their unique fall texture.

Permanent fall berries, leaves, or a vine, like bittersweet, add color and additional texture and excitement.

I also like to include smaller pumpkins, gourds, and my fall favorite -- osage oranges, or hedge apples.

There's no wrong way to create a tablescape.

Add as much or as little as you like.

I love decorating with flowers for every season.

Thanksgiving is a great time for us to enhance the table with beautiful flowers.

But it doesn't always have to be about fall colors.

So today, we're creating an arrangement that's inspired by this beautiful rainbow Indian corn.

I got this at the farmers market, and it's different -- it has purples and blues, greens, and even oranges and sages.

So that's our inspiration, and we're adding other flowers to go with it.

We'll start with a full block of soaked flower foam.

I've cut off the corners so it'll fit down nicely into my pedestal container.

Next, we've bundled our multi-colored decorative corn together in threes.

I've bound those off using bind wire so it was decorative.

I take a bamboo stake and shove it through the husks and into the flower foam.

This will secure the multi-colored corn in place for the arrangement.

I'm gonna leave the sticks long right now and trim them at the very end.

Next, we'll add our rosemary.

I love using fresh herbs in an arrangement because it enhances the fragrance of the arrangement.

I got this beautiful tweedia, and I'm using it as an accent because it brings out the blue in the flint corn.

Next, I'll add my stock, another fragrant blossom, and the deep purple enhances the color in the ears of corn.

Next, we use the chocolate lace.

It's like a purple-colored Queen Anne's Lace.

And that purple color gets magnified because we're placing it next to the purple stock.

I've got some purple cushion spray chrysanthemums.

I love chrysanthemums, especially in autumn work, because they're just so beautiful, and now there's so many varieties available.

We'll add branch material.

I like that.

It could be natural branches that are cut outside in your yard, or it could be ones that you pick up from your local flower seller.

Final step is to through and cut off the bamboo stakes, making sure that they don't show.

Because the bamboo is the same color as the corn husks, they virtually disappear.

So, you see, you can make any color work when it comes to Thanksgiving.

It's all about having flowers on the table, especially when you're surrounded by family and friends.

I'll be making a project today inside this wreath frame.

It's soaked flower foam, and it has a hard plastic back so you can set something in the middle.

And that's where we'll set our bubble bowl with a little bit of gravel and our candle.

But we'll make the arrangement first.

We're gonna be using variegated Aspidistra leaves.

This is also known as the cast-iron plant.

The great part about these leaves is that they last a long time.

We'll add our Aspidistra leaves first.

When we do this, we're gonna use a special technique for it.

We're gonna cut the stems short, and we're gonna cut it sharp.

Then we're gonna turn it around and poke it through the leaf.

So now we have a little loop that looks like that.

And we're gonna take that loop, we're gonna stick our stem directly into the foam.

So what that's gonna do is, we're gonna have loops all the way around.

I use 20 Aspidistra leaves, and this is called beautybush, or some people call it Christmas bush, but it's pretty, too, and it's long-lasting.

One of the other things we're gonna use is called brunia.

They're like little green balls.

Great texture.

We'll be using pincushion proteas.

They're called pincushions because they look like a pincushion.

And they're very long-lasting.

When I cut my protea, I take off the leaves and make sure the stem is sharp, in case I have to go through leaf into the foam.

Now we have our bubble bowl with our candle inside.

I've added a little bit of gravel in the bottom.

We can set it down in the center and light the candle.

It's a romantic way to include flowers and foliage at home.

Apple harvests are a sure sign of autumn.

And what better ingredient than apple butter for this Flower Cocktail Hour.

We'll start with an orange... ...so we can rim our glass with cinnamon and sugar.

We'll add ice to our shaker.

We'll add 2 ounces of bourbon.

And 3 tablespoons of apple butter.

A pinch of cinnamon.

And we'll shake.

[ Rattling ] We'll strain this into our glass.

[ Rattling ] And we'll finish it with ginger beer.

That's delicious.

It tastes like an apple harvest.

Sometimes baskets don't come with liners, so we have to figure out something that will go down inside.

Today, we're using the brown-colored mach.

This is a mach pan that fits down inside, and it has tar in the bottom so that it's waterproof.

Then we can place our soaked flower foam inside.

It's also great because we can reuse it time and time again.

We'll start with the background for our fall arrangement.

I'm adding some beautiful magnolia.

I love that it has a brown velvet back, and that's gonna look beautiful with these fall colors.

On one of my walks after a windstorm, I found this nest.

It's an actual bird's nest, but it had fallen out of the tree, and it was sitting there without a purpose.

I'll put it between the two magnolia branches and then secure it in place with a couple of bamboo stakes.

We're also using Ming in a chocolate brown.

We'll also have some chocolate-brown tree fern that we'll use later.

Now it's time for the fall chrysanthemums.

We'll start with Dorado.

This one's really exciting because it has such a neon-yellow color.

It really is gonna create interest in our arrangement, and it's gonna be unavoidable for our eye to look at.

Then we'll add the Magnus, down deep into the arrangement, so that we almost have to search for them.

I love the intense color they have.

I love the interesting variation of color on the Kratos daisy spray chrysanthemums.

There's a little yellow edge, and that's gonna highlight the yellow in the rest of the arrangement.

Next, we have our cushion pompons -- appetit and appetit yellow.

The bronze and yellow activate the other colors in the arrangement.

I've saved the best for last -- Chispa.

This Fuji chrysanthemum is electric and exciting.

It's almost like fireworks going off over the top of the other flowers.

I've used all the stem placements vertically, but there's different layers, so there's lots of depth to this arrangement.

As I've said before, fall is one of my favorite times of the year.

And this arrangement, you can get lost in it.

There's so many different levels and so many things to look at from every single angle.

It simply makes the season right.

I hope you've enjoyed our special show celebrating the autumn season.

Nature provides an amazing ambiance to enjoy, indoors and outside.

Consider expressing your gratitude by engaging your senses with this very special time of year.

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

Visit J's website, ubloom.com, for flower projects and crafts, complete recipes, behind-the-scenes videos, J's blog, flower cocktails, and more.

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

At home.

At work.

Or anytime.

CalFlowers 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... Dollar Tree.

Closed-caption funding provided by Holland America Flowers.