It’s October 14 when I talk to Lynette Marsack, owner of Kraatz Florist. She’s in Henry Ford Hospital, awaiting brain surgery the following day. But that doesn’t stop Lynette from scheduling and having this interview.
“The first of October, I was rushed to the hospital thinking I was having a stroke,” she recalls. After tests, doctors discovered a tumor. It was benign, but brain surgery is always a risk.
“Life just happens when you’re making plans,” Lynette philosophizes. “We’re not as much in control as we think we are. We just got to play the game and keep moving along.”
It seems like a cue to change the subject, so I ask Lynette for her favorite holiday tradition involving flowers.
“Probably decorating my store for the holidays. I start right after Halloween, and it just goes and goes and goes until the 24th of December. Christmas trees, garlands, wreaths—and all my Christmas gifts.”
Lynette looks around the hospital room. “I don’t know what I’m going to do.”
I realize she means this year, and tomorrow’s surgery. I wonder how long the expected recovery period is; she tells me eight weeks.
“I can’t worry about it,” Lynette muses.
The conversation returns to flowers. Lynette tells me Kraatz decorates many offices for the holidays. “In fact, the hospital that I’m sitting in right now—Henry Ford—I decorate,” she smiles.
Kraatz’s most popular arrangements during the holidays are centerpieces. Lynette’s customers send Kraatz centerpieces to long lists of friends, family or clients. “Wintergreens, berries, branches, pinecones, beautiful ribbon loops, carnations—they give you that feeling of the holiday,” she says.
Lynette says nature offers anyone a chance to be creative.
“Take a pair of clippers, go outside, and start cutting winter branches of all sorts of evergreens. Then just tie them together and drop them in a vase. Perhaps you could stick some birch branches in—the white shows up beautiful with wintergreens—and tie a red velvet shoelace bow around the vase. It just looks like the holidays all wrapped up.”
I ask for more tips. What flowers complement holiday decor? “Poinsettias come in brilliant colors—reds, burgundies, even in speckled now— ‘Jingle Bells,’ it’s called. Just a variety of palettes for anyone’s home.” For a focal point, Lynette suggests amaryllis: “The vibrant red is so striking—deep, dark, rich.” If you’re into the unique, Lynette advises accenting with silvers and golds in arrangements or wreaths: “add a touch of sparkly, glittery branches or trims.”
To make your home, as Lynette puts it, “smell like the holidays,” she says you want wintergreens: “juniper, princess pine, the spruces, noble fir, Douglas fir. Cedar is a very popular one too.” To blend with wintergreens, Lynette offers up white phalaenopsis ‘moth’ orchids.
Keeping your flowers throughout the holidays is doable, Lynette says, with a little maintenance. “Just always change your water once a week and give your stems a fresh cut. They can last longer—even into the new year.”
It’s time for us to wrap up the interview. I explain to Lynette that this article won’t come out until the end of November, six weeks after tomorrow’s surgery. So I suggest we use the article as a manifestation prayer. I ask Lynette to talk to me from the future.
She finds the words.
“I am blessed to have had the support of my family and my friends. My doctor’s team was exceptional. This has been a life-changing event. I am thankful that I’m almost fully recovered. My head’s going to be shaved for a while, and my energy level is not what it was, but I’m getting there. But I’m so grateful to be back in the store, among all my beautiful flowers again.”
To which we all say simply: amen.
Lynette's surgery the following day went successfully. She continues to recover.
The team at Kraatz is ready to help you find the perfect centerpiece, stop in at 301 Cass Avenue in Mount Clemens or call (586) 463-8688. Mention "City Lifestyle" for free delivery.
For that holiday scent: “juniper, princess pine, the spruces, noble fir, Douglas fir. Cedar is a very popular one too.”