It was a late-summer evening, but fall was in the air. There were no witches on brooms flying by, but a MetLife blimp passed overhead.
The setting was our Camp Hill store, where the staff engaged in its annual scarecrow contest. This year’s event had a wedding theme.
It’s an outdoor wedding, of course, and you’re invited to attend. And if you visit the store, be sure to let Holly, Aimee and the rest of the team know which of the scarecrows you like best.
The Greek mathematician Archimedes said that with a long-enough lever and a fulcrum, he could move the world.
That’s a pretty lofty goal. What if you are just searching for the right words to accompany the flowers that you’re sending to a loved one?
Royer’s website offers more than 200 quotations and expressions to help you say what needs to be said. They cover everything from anniversaries and birthdays to love and marriage, business and education to sympathy and thank you.
For instance, here are seven ways to say you’re sorry:
1. “Accept these flowers in place of the words I said.”
2. “I wouldn’t have made a mistake with my mouth shut.”
3. “I’m wrong – you’re right.”
4. “I muffed it! I’m so sorry!”
5. “I’ll never forgive myself … but I’m hoping you will. I’m sorry.”
6. “I may not be perfect, but my apology is close.”
7. “Will these keys let me out of the doghouse? I’m sorry.”
Feel free to pick one or cobble together your own version from these suggestions.
We can’t promise that your words will move the world, but they will be a really nice complement to the flowers you send.
Our annual Royer’s Stems Hunger food drive collected 2,157 pounds of non-perishable items for the Central Pennsylvania Food Bank and the Greater Berks Food Bank.
From June 20-28, “Royer’s Stems Hunger” asked customers to drop off donations at any of our stores. In return, customers received a free carnation for each food item, up to a maximum of six carnations per family per visit.
The stores collected 1,638 pounds of food and $182.15 in cash contributions.
Also contributing was Drayer Physical Therapy Institute, which participated in the food drive for the first time. Drayer’s outpatient centers in Camp Hill, Carlisle, Lancaster, Lebanon and Mechanicsburg collected 519 pounds and $75.
Thanks to Drayer and to everyone else who has helped to make our event so successful. In its first four years, Royer’s Stems Hunger has collected more than 7,100 pounds of food for the food banks.
We’re celebrating the start of a new school year with a free Royer’s Kids Club event Aug. 23 in each of our stores.
Children ages 5 to 12 will have an opportunity to create a daisy arrangement adorned with a “back-to-school” stick-in. Participants also will receive a free balloon.
Time slots are available at 10 a.m., 2 p.m. and 3 p.m. Registration is required by calling your nearest Royer’s store: click here for locations and contact information.
Happy 200th Birthday to Mountville, Lancaster County!
The borough kicked off its weeklong bicentennial celebration with a parade on Aug. 2.
Our Columbia store, which serves Mountville, entered Royer’s classic 1969 Ford Econoline delivery van in the procession. Store manager Patti Barclay and her team walked beside the van and handed out 400 carnations to spectators.
In advance of opening West Shore Hospital in May, PinnacleHealth System sought a new floral vendor that could keep up with the growing volume of orders from its three hospital boutique gift shops.
Royer’s Camp Hill store won a multi-year contract to service the new hospital as well as the established Harrisburg Hospital and Community General Osteopathic Hospital. The partnership began April 1.
“It’s just been extremely good the whole time,” said Joan Line, manager for PinnacleHealth Auxiliary.
She works closely with the Camp Hill store’s Holly Newpower, manager, and Aimee Arrowood, assistant manager. Royer’s delivers flowers at various price points to the hospitals every week, but Line also has been impressed with how requests have been accommodated on weekends.
“If a family comes in and wants a special arrangement,” she said, “all we have to do is call Holly and Amy and they will bring it in.”
PinnacleHealth’s gift shops are open 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday to Friday and noon to 4 p.m. Saturday and Sunday.
What’s more, PinnacleHealth Auxiliary’s website includes an online gift shop, and orders placed there are filled by Royer’s. Or if customers buy flowers on Royer’s website that are destined for a PinnacleHealth hospital, Royer’s gives a small percentage of each sale back to PinnacleHealth Auxiliary.
The nonprofit PinnacleHealth Auxiliary manages the three gift shops. All of the proceeds from the gift shops come back to the hospitals to support various programs and services.
Holly, Royer’s manager in Camp Hill, called the PinnacleHealth Auxiliary partnership “a huge deal” for her store.
“More than just selling flowers,” she said, “it’s benefitting the community, too.”
Added PinnacleHealth’s Line: “It’s just a good match.”
Meanwhile, six other Royer’s stores service eight other area hospital gift shops:
East York: Apple Hill Surgical Center
Ephrata: WellSpan Ephrata Community Hospital, Heart of Lancaster Regional Medical Center
Lancaster West: Lancaster General Hospital, Women & Babies Hospital
Lebanon: Good Samaritan Hospital
Reading: Reading Hospital
West York: WellSpan York Hospital
Ephrata Middle School seventh-grader Julia Longenecker is a swimmer and a basketball player. She loves dogs and reading.
The daughter of John and Sandy Longenecker is pretty fond of drawing, too.
“She draws a little bit of everything,” Sandy said. “She likes to draw pictures of animals, flowers.”
In fact, one of Julia’s flower drawings has earned her another descriptor: winner of Royer’s Flowers & Gifts’ 2014 Royer’s Kids Club birthday card design contest.
Her drawing of a flower-filled vase will grace the electronic card that Royer’s Kids Club members will receive on their birthdays in the coming year. For her effort, she will receive a flower delivery on her birthday.
For the fourth time in as many years as the Lebanon Daily News has recognized the “Best of the Lebanon Valley,” the newspaper’s readers have voted Royer’s their favorite florist.
Royer’s has always called Lebanon home: Our family-owned business started there in 1937 and operates its flagship store at 810 S. 12th St., Lebanon, and 901 E. Main St., Palmyra.
Overall, Royer’s has 17 stores in Berks, Cumberland, Dauphin, Lancaster, Lebanon and York counties.
“Best of the Lebanon Valley” comprised 114 categories and two rounds of reader participation. Results were announced on June 18.
So you bought annual plants in a container at your local florist, garden center or home-improvement store.
Annual plants – such as petunias, geraniums and begonias that complete their life cycles in one year – pose perennial challenges once you bring them home.
Here are five things you should know about caring for your annuals:
1. You have to add nutrients: Your plant didn’t come in nutrient-rich soil. Rather, it’s a potting mix that includes peat moss. This mixture is inert, meaning that it doesn’t contain the nutrients found in soil. So you have to add the nutrients by applying fertilizer on a regular basis.
2. Fertilizer is soluble, so you have to keep adding it: Regular watering of your annual plants will wash out the added nutrients if the container has drainage holes on the bottom.
3. Don’t add too much fertilizer: One of the ingredients in fertilizer is salt. Too much fertilizer – and with it, too much salt – can damage plant roots. The salt in the fertilizer will remove whatever moisture is left in the roots and burn them.
4. Cut the amount in half: Whatever dosage the fertilizer manufacturer recommends, consider cutting the amount in half and fertilizing every time you water. This way you have less of a chance of burning the roots, and your plant gets a continual supply of nutrients rather than peaks and valleys.
5. Give them a pinch: Remove the old blooms and pinch a plant’s tips, which will force out new growth. An occasional light trim will keep a plant bushy and blooming.
With proper care, your annual plants will bloom beautifully for you this summer.