Every Princess Deserves A Bloom Or Two

As a supportive parent who wanna treasure every milestone our daughter passes through, I am that borderline-stagemom-wannabee, who strictly adheres to this specific recital/competition etiquette -- flowers/bouquet for my princess.

I always tell my husband, it is customary, it is important, it is a must! This is after going through series of competitions, with recital mixed into it, my better-half can't help himself but complain. Then I remind him again that it's our own little way of showing her how much we support her, that, we appreciate her efforts and her desire to do her best.

At one point I asked myself, "can we actually get away without one?" ( for her last competition, especially given the fact that we just gave her a bouquet for her recital the day before). Nope. I felt so guilty before the awarding, that I ended up buying a single rose.

What I learned though is that, although it may be okay to get away with it, but there are different ways where we can save a bit. Flowers are not cheap, but we can surely shop around or spin a DIY for a personal touch.

I am used to buying a bouquet for Khloe's every recital. This ranges from regular-dozen roses to a dozen of long-stemmed roses. I avoid the preppy-expensive flower shoppe. Like seriously, my little ballerina wouldn't know the difference. I would pre-order it at either Zehrs or Sobey's. Just let them know it's for a recital and they'll have it ready with that pink little bow and wrappings. With Sobey's, you can actually pick a bouquet of your choice and they'll arrange it for you. You can walk away with a beautiful bunch for less than $20.

On her first gymnastics competition, I decided to spin it into something smaller. I am not sure what's the general consensus, but I thought of getting a cute, smaller bouquet. Then Sobey's made me this:

Sans the balloon, it was less than $15. Khloe loves it... as it was just of right size. Her next competition 2 months after was out-of-town. We ran out of time evening prior, so we pulled over to the next personalized-cookie store. And this is what we came up with:

As it's a last minute thing, this cookie/gummybear bouquet is twice the amount of the one above. And nope, I am not gonna do that pulling-over splurging ever again.

For her first competition this year, I decided to put my personal touch on it. As this meet is one that we are hosting at our home-gym, cramming is out of the question. So I picked a bouquet of small roses and came up with this:

I threw in a cutie bear that says "I love you", and for the roses, I paid $9 for a bunch. The rest of the craft supplies came from my craft box.

I guess, what I am trying to share is that... making our little ones feeling loved and supported doesn't require lotssa $$$ from our card or wallet. These kids don't expect fancy flowers. All they wanna see is that proud look on our face, and that little reassurance that we are always there for them.

It's all in that little thought. Sometimes, even fake flowers can do the trick.