FA M I LY
UNICORNS ARE FOR KIDS I
pick up the phone and the voice of my mother sounds brighter than it has in months. “Celia called,” she says. “Oh?” I answer, raising an eyebrow. I hadn’t heard the name of her good friend in several months. “What did she say?” “She said it hurt her feelings when I didn’t want to walk with her anymore.” “Oh?” I reply. “Weren’t we just talking about how you miss those walks?” “We were!” she said. “I told her, ‘I never said that. I love walking with you, I thought you were too busy and didn’t want to walk with me.’” “And what did she say?” “Well, we’re going walking tomorrow and I’m just so glad she called,” she said, her voice shining like the sun.
I’m telling this story because I can relate. My mom is 73 and she’s lifted up and really hurt by the same trigger that started for most of us in grade school: female friendships. In Raising Girls, Steve Biddulph writes, “Friends are important to most of us, but for girls, they are like the oxygen they breathe.” From my vantage right between girl and septuagenarian, in my thirties running a mostly stay-at-home-mom gig with three kids, I wasn’t prepared for both the depth and the length of all these relationships. Motherhood has been rapid-fire friendship 101. Going in, there was this expectation to find my person, or my people. I’d moved to the other side of L.A., we had no family in town, and I needed an emergency contact. But we didn’t know anyone
that well yet. And then there was that made-up unicorn mom I was longing for. I would be Cat, she’d be Nat. We’d vent together, laugh together. She’d be the sanity break following an imaginary-play marathon. The work of momming all day with no other adults felt isolating. To have that one trusted person to get through it with would make everything easier. But I know now, friendships don’t necessarily work that way. The way I’ve seen it, the shape of the motherhood friendship rollercoaster
AC T I V I T E S , PROGR A MS A N D MOR E SUPER BLOOMS Laura Williams of Poppy Hill Flowers (poppyhillflowers. com) says the best part of making a flower crown is that once you know the basics, you can just play. She answers our other questions here … What flowers work best? Anything light without heavy stems, like chrysanthemums. Choose what you’re drawn toward. What makes a crown stand out? Add a large statement flower just off-center. Choose something that drapes down
16 PA S A D E N A
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H OW TO F LOW E R C R OW N a bit to frame the face and attach it by your temple. Any trends you’re seeing? Designers are adding preserved floral elements to crowns. You can use only preserved florals and keep the crown forever! What did you learn from your mother? The importance of hosting. She taught me to set a beautiful table and she poured hours into her dinner parties because she wanted her guests to know they were loved.
Time: 30 minutes
together to secure a circle shape.
1 Gather materials: flowers, hempcovered wire (18 gauge), paddle wire (26 gauge), floral tape, and floral clippers.
3 Strip and trim flower stems to 3
2 Measure the covered wire loosely
around your head. Cut wire, leaving excess so you can twist the ends
inches. Prepare larger flowers by pushing a 4-inch piece of paddle wire alongside the stem, just through the center of the bloom. Trim excess wire.
4 Set the crown on a flat surface and play with various flower arrangements.
5 Pick up the crown and one flower. Start tightly wrapping floral tape to secure the stem to the crown. Continue wrapping and adding new stems until flowers are secure and the crown is filled out. —J. A . R .
PAINTING BY LAUIRE HENDRICKS
As an adult, I’ve realized that when it comes to friendship and motherhood, the BFF of our dreams is perhaps an illusion. BY J E N N I F E R A S H TO N RYA N
