It was a “Day for Friends and Flowers” on Saturday, September 22, at the Japanese Friendship Garden. Several people brought friends, and everyone made friends as we worked on our Shoka Shimputai arrangements. But it was not only friends and flowers, it was SHOPPING! There were two amazing ginza tables filled with vases and hasami and kensans and MUCH MORE. It was a labor of love that prompted our Chapter President, Linnéa Storm, and Second Vice President, Connie Scholl, to clean, catalog, price and prepare all these beautiful items, many of which were donated by long-time member and past president, Pat Kuffler.
There was a book there for sale titled “Shoka Shimputai.” In it is the advice: “Shimputai, like any style of Ikenobo Ikebana cannot be learned from a book alone. It is meant to be used while studying with a qualified Ikenobo teacher”…like our own Linnéa Storm. She walked us through the history of the style, all its basic components, and then let us create arrangements that expressed our own feelings about the beauty hidden within each of the floral materials we chose.
Friends, flowers and shopping. What else could one ask for on a sunny Saturday in Phoenix, AZ.
Margaret Michel
Marty Sellars
Marylou Coffman
Pat Kuffler
Shelly Dessen
Toby Schmich
Wanda LaLoggia
Connie Scholl
Daira Legzdina
Evie Norins
Iris Cashdan-Fishman
Linnéa Storm
Linnéa Storm
Pat Maguire
