Summer holidays are well underway in Madrid and with temperatures well over 40 C (104 F), we have been looking for ways to keep cool. We decided to experiment with freezing water-filled water balloons, to see what sort of arrangements we could make.
My daughter filled small balloons with water and tied the ends. She placed the balloons in the freezer.
After half a day we cut open the balloons to discover that the outer layer of the water had turned to ice, but the inside was still liquid. Isabel immediately decided that the frozen balloon would make the perfect vase.
She chose some blue hydrangea flowers and a few leaves of variegated maple (Acer palmatum ‘butterfly’) from our garden.
Working very quickly, she placed a couple of small hydrangea flowers inside the frozen ‘vase’.
She added the maple leaves and to finish she quickly added another hydrangea flower. We photographed her arrangement and watched as her truly ephemeral ikebana arrangement disappeared, the vase melting in the heat.