Well this has always been one of my goals to achieve my NZ Professional Florists Diploma before I turned 50.
Yes I have been a florist since I was 20, so I have plenty of experience and have worked under some amazing florists over the past few years and have learned a lot and gained skills and confidence to be the florist that I am today. But when I heard of this opportunity I knew that it was now my time to do something about achieving this goal.
Well here’s my journey…
July is when I contacted Mrs A, our beautiful NZPF secretary, who keeps everyone in line. To register my interest, she sent me back the information with instructions to complete and get witnessed by a JP. Once approved she sent me the Diploma written portfolio that was required before the weekend practical exam.
The deadline was the 7th of September. When I first looked at it I was overwhelmed with all the writing that I needed to do and also how to answer the client brief, but I knew I just had to do this part as we had been told that this was the first part of the assessment and if we didn't pass the written, we actually don't pass the Diploma, and one of the rules was no resits. I put my brain into gear and started writing. I got it completed and made sure that it was delivered on time by delivering it myself on a Sunday - you can never be too sure of couriers these days. That was a huge relief to get that done.
Then the nervous wait to see if I had passed, even if I didn't pass this stage I would have always done the practical for the experience as it had been a long time since I had done any sort of exam. Well, you guessed it: I passed.
Feeling really proud that I had done this, I now had the challenge of coming up with 3 designs for the practical and the hardest decision was to choose between a wedding or funeral context. I have always loved doing weddings, but after talking with my family, other florist’s that I have worked for in the past, and florist friends, everyone told me to go with the funeral questions, and my gut told me the same. I read and reread the questions and thought hard on how to make this WOW!!! Lots of sketches, scribbles, and research as each piece required its own unique design.
Finally, I came to the final week before the exam where I had to start buying the flowers and foliage that I was going to be needing. I had to go and start picking native foliage from family and friends' gardens. The week flew by and I don't know where it went, but I woke up to find that it was Friday 6 October and I needed to pack everything that I would be needing for my designs, my toolbox, and make my way to the Distinction Hotel in Palmerston North. We could arrive at the hotel any time from 2pm but we had to have all our prep work and workstations set up by 7pm. 5 hours sounds like a long time but it goes quickly.
I went to bed early that night but woke up on Saturday morning at 5am and was keen to get started. I lay there just thinking and going through in my head the plan of how the time was allocated to each piece and worked through how the 5 hours for the exam would work. At 8.45am we had our final briefing from Megan, and were ready to start at 9am. We had 90 mins per piece with 15 mins at the end to complete costing sheets,15 mins to clean up, and leave the room at 2pm. Sounds like a lot of time but before you know it Mrs A is calling out that we had 15 mins to do costing sheets and then a further 15 mins to clean up. I know she made regular time calls throughout the exam but the time just flew by…
The relief and emotion that it was over for the 7 of us was intense and all we could do now was drink a gin or two and wait approximately 14 days for this all to be marked, assessed and moderated.
The final days of waiting were over and to my surprise and relief the results said that I had passed.
I thank the NZPF board for having this opportunity for students to gain their Diploma. I personally want to thank my family, florist friends and those that encouraged and mentored me through this journey of mine (yes, I did this before I was 50 by 1 day).