Flower Delivery Caloundra, Same Day to Unit or Ward

You have heard it is Dove House now, the palliative unit at Caloundra Hospital on West Terrace, and you are either on your way or you can't be. In our experience flowers there are welcome. They go to the desk, addressed with the patient's full name, and staff carry them in. Our hospital flowers are a good place to start.

Siobhan and I delivered to Tweed Hospital ourselves, from 2006 to 2009. In 2008 I walked into the wrong room holding pink roses addressed to a woman. The man in the bed looked at the roses, then at me, and said, "Mate, if she doesn't want them, I'll have them." A nurse sent me two doors along. I asked for the room twice from then on. Dove House is a much smaller place than Tweed Hospital, and the lesson still holds: put the full name, "Dove House" and the room, if you have it, in the notes. For the card, short is plenty: "Thinking of you every day."

Anna, on a bedside table's worth

Keep it small and low on scent. Palliative rooms tend to be small, and oriental lilies and stock carry a big perfume, lovely in a lounge room and a lot in a room that size. Roses, lisianthus and chrysanthemum give colour without filling the air.

Mum turns eighty this week, in a unit off Bulcock Street or a room in care, and you are nowhere near the candles. For a room in care, at BlueCare on West Terrace or another home in town, the room number goes in the notes. For a unit, add her mobile. In our experience the florist rings it rather than leave flowers on a hot landing.

Bright suits a birthday for Mum. Chrysanthemum, carnation and alstroemeria hold their colour a good week or more in a warm unit, and alstroemeria keeps opening new buds after the first ones fade.

A funeral is coming up and the details are reaching you second-hand, by text. Flowers for the service go to the funeral director; flowers for the family home can go the day after and sit on the kitchen table for a week. For a service with Gregson & Weight in Gregson Place, put their name, the date and the start time in the notes, and the florist works back from the time. Caloundra Cemetery on Queen Street closed to new burials in 2024, so check the notice for where the graveside is. A card line that works: "With love, and sorry we can't be there."

From the bench: white, cream and soft green sit quietly in a chapel, with a little grey foliage so the arrangement never looks cold.

Plenty of orders fit no heading at all: a new job, a neighbour who fed the cat for a month, a thank-you to the nurses on a ward. Anna has a view on this.

Roses. They come in a colour for every one of those, and in a room out of direct sun they open slowly over the best part of a week. Match the colour to the job: yellow or pink for a thank-you, red only when you mean it.