Williamston, Mich., resident Mary Clare Brown picks out flowers for an arrangement during a workshop, Aug. 2, 2014, at the Allen Neighborhood Center's Hunter Park GardenHouse in Lansing. The workshop taught attendees how to best use garden flowers in vases. Danyelle Morrow/The State News
Lansing resident and MSU alumna Barbara Laxton has been gardening and arranging flower bouquets for many years, but Saturday was her first time leading a flower arranging workshop for the Allen Neighborhood Center's Hunter Park GardenHouse.
"Some people came into our main office and said 'I really love your arrangements, are you a florist? You should teach a workshop,'" she said. "So I volunteered to do (just) that."
Laxton, who is also a community health worker at the Allen Neighborhood Center in Lansing, works with terminally ill patients in her day job.
Gardening and flower arranging, Laxton said, can be therapeutic and, most importantly, fun.
"A lot of people buy flowers or grow flowers, but when they try to put them in a vase it never turns out like in the pictures," she said. "So today we will be doing a basic arrangement in four or five steps."
Samantha MacFarland, the gardening educator for the GardenHouse, began working with the program after studying organic farming at MSU.
"The GardenHouse and the workshops, (they are) all low-income based and donations, so everyone can come and afford it," she said. "They get a great experience. When you're working in the gardens (it) is such a positive and friendly environment and it takes you out of the city hustle and bustle."
About 10 people visited the workshop Saturday and learned how to create floral arrangements under the canopy next to the GardenHouse.
Lansing resident Amalia Whittaker came to the workshop and said it was her first formal training in flower arranging.
"I just got married and did all my flowers myself, and it was ... the most fun thing I've ever done so I wanted to learn a little more about it," she said.
At the end of the workshop, each participant was able to take home the arrangement they made, including a vase provided by the GardenHouse. In the future, the GardenHouse will offer more gardening-centric classes, such as how to preserve excess fruits and vegetables.
The GardenHouse also offers service projects and youth programs for children living in the Lansing area.
"The GardenHouse really is one of the most wonderful things in Lansing," Laxton said.
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