About 720 roses.
Bear Creek Florist owner Lisa Aliment’s eyes opened wide when she thought of all those roses, many of which she was donating to four Redmond and two Kirkland nursing and senior care facilities on Monday.
The Redmond business along with Teleflora were promoting “Make Someone Smile Week” by delivering smiley-face mugs and colorful floral arrangements provided by Doug and Robin Otani of Northwest Wholesale florist in Seattle.
Aliment and her store’s manager Linda MacRae worked from 7 a.m. to noon on Sunday at Northwest Wholesale cranking out bouquets as fast they could, Aliment said, adding that they then made a pair of deliveries to senior facilities in Bellevue and Issaquah.
The Reporter tagged along with Aliment on two of her drop-offs on Monday at Merrill Gardens at Kirkland and Peters Creek Retirement Center in Redmond. The bouquets featured several varieties of roses in the hues of red, magenta, pink, orange and yellow.
Terri Brimm, move-in coordinator at Merrill Gardens, helped Aliment place the roses on tables in the dining room.
“It’s always special when people will donate flowers to us. This is the first time we’ve ever had a florist do this, however, so it is really great,” Brimm said. “The residents really appreciate having fresh flowers on the table — it makes their day.”
Aliment — whose store was voted Best Florist in the Reporter’s Best of Redmond contest — said that Teleflora previously donated the mugs with a few yellow roses and white daisy palms inside. This year, Northwest Wholesale came through with flying colors with the vast amount of roses.
“So we were able to bump up the volume and the look of these wonderful smiley-face mugs,” she said. She told Brimm, “These are your bouquets, you can put them on your tables and let all the residents enjoy them. Maybe there’s a few residents, something’s going on in their lives and they just need that extra smile for that week. They’re having a tough time right now.”
Aliment noted that many residents used to have gardens and they appreciate having flowers around them again.
Over at Peters Creek, General Manager Marcia Byrd said the 65 residents, ages 85 to 95 years old, will enjoy Aliment’s gifts.
“Bottom line is our residents sometimes don’t have family members that come and visit them, so we’re able to give them flowers and tell them that we wanted them to smile today, and it makes a huge impact for them,” Byrd said. “They look forward to the mailman coming everyday and they can look forward now to getting flowers and things like that.”
