As soon as the doors of the horticulture garden open, those who step inside are immediately met with the bright yellow, blooming section of sunflowers. These flowers were the main element of many bouquets arranged by attendees for the Bloom and Breathe event in honor of Mother’s Day on May 7.
Participants filled the garden eager to pick out their own arrangement of flowers, between the vines and prickly rose bushes butterflies were in full spring around the small sunflower field.
As Mother’s Day was around the corner, many were seeking to show out for their loved one in any way they could, including one student in attendance Eryka Edwards who used the event to arrange a free bouquet with the intention to give her mom the extra boost Eryka says she needs.
“She needs the boost. She’s been putting herself down more than usual lately, and I just want to show her that you are still gorgeous, you are still wonderful and you’re talented … so I won’t hear it,” Eryka said.
The Bloom and Breathe event attracted many students to attend, as the event was set to end at 1:30 p.m. but as the workshop came to a close, horticulture’s gate would open with others asking if there was still time to select their flower arrangements.
After walking into the garden attendees were given a pair of floral snips and were instructed to one area of the green space which had sunflowers, roses, lavenders and many vines that were able to be used as decoration to elevate the bouquets.
Five students were allowed in at a time to select and arrange their flowers, which was a better organizational system compared to last year’s event.
Last year’s event was the first and Gladys Lopez, a mental health clinician part of student health services, described the chaos as someone who helped put on the event.
“This year we were like, can we do it again? But we were just a little bit more organized because last year it was with, like, vases and it was everywhere, there were too many students at once so he (Jorge Ochoa) kind of had a different plan this year,” Lopez said.
Finished flower bouquets created by the Bloom and Breathe attendees. The event was held at LBCC’s TTC campus on May 7, giving students a chance to personally pick from a variety of flowers for Mother’s Day. (Jayleen Vasquez)
Lopez and horticulture professor Jorge Ochoa helped create the Bloom and Breathe event after Lopez wanted to use the garden to offer an event to Spanish speaking students.
As a result, many attendees were native Spanish speakers, as the workshop was first organized to create an inclusive and welcoming environment.
After selecting from a variety of flowers, students were then pointed to wrapping the flowers they chose with Ochoa who helped put together the finishing touches on their personalized arrangements. Ochoa carefully selected elements like ribbons and decorative vines that complimented students’ flowers.
The horticulture workshop was put into place with Mother’s Day in mind but also worked to expose students to horticulture gardens as well as it was a tranquil activity Lopez said.
“Self care and you know mental health, just to be out here and get familiar with this area because a lot of students don’t know about it… even students that come here they don’t know so just imagine LAC they don’t even come here,” Lopez said.
Each bouquet that left the horticulture gardens included a sunflower, a flower that the horticulture garden was in abundance of.
Ochoa noted that the goal of the event was to allow participants to harvest their own flowers, noting there was no concern about students doing so given the supply of sunflowers.
“It was the purpose to have people come and harvest their own flowers so I think that’s the important thing. You buy flowers but you don’t really get a chance to really just go there and harvest them,” Ochoa said.
The Bloom and Breathe workshop was put together by a collaborative effort between student health services and horticulture staff to create a calming and inclusive space where students could be exposed to horticulture gardens and practice tranquility, self care and leave with personalized bouquets selected by their own hands
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