Same Day Flower Delivery Kuluin, House, Ward or Service

The birthday is today and you're in Brisbane, or stuck at a desk. Order before 2pm and the flowers go out this afternoon; if nobody's in, the notes say where to leave them, and at Regis a room number does the finding. Start with our birthday bestsellers, or birthday flowers for Mum.

My favourite birthday order came in person, at our shop on Marine Parade in Kingscliff in 2007: a boy of about eight tipped a sandwich bag of coins on the counter (six dollars forty, he'd counted it twice) and asked for the ones that looked expensive. He got them, and I spelled birthday for his card, slowly, while he watched. Andrew still says we ran at a loss on that one. Best loss we ever made. Kuluin is school runs and birthday parties too, and the card is still what gets kept.

Anna's call: gerberas for a birthday kitchen, like the Gerbera Bunch + Teddy + Birthday Balloon, with fresh water every couple of days. The stem is hollow, and bacteria clog it faster than most.

The ward number usually comes second-hand, off a text. For Sunshine Coast University Hospital at Birtinya or Buderim Private on Elsa Wilson Drive, put the hospital, ward and full name on the order; in our experience the ward desk takes the flowers in. Home by the weekend? Send get well flowers to the house instead; otherwise hospital flowers go to the ward. On the card, “Thinking of you. Love from all of us” says enough.

A ward bedside is a tray table and a water jug. Something already in its vase, like the Natives Flowers With A Vase, goes straight on, and natives keep their pollen to themselves.

Someone has died and you're working out where flowers even go. A wreath or sheath (a flat spray for the casket) goes to the funeral director before the service, with the director's name and start time in the notes: see wreaths and sheaths. Sympathy flowers for the home can follow a week later, when the house goes quiet; in my years on the phones, those were the ones families rang to say thank you for. “Thinking of you all, with love” is plenty.

Anna, on colour

Whites, creams and soft greens sit beside grief without competing with it. The White Lily & Rose Sheath lies flat, so it suits a casket, or a lawn grave where a vase would tip.

Plenty of flowers don't fit a heading: the teacher who got the kids through Year 2, the neighbour who fed the cat, the friend who's had a rotten month. Our thank-you flowers and mixed flowers cover most of it.

Anna's pick: the Lovely Lilac & Lime Bunch. Lilac and lime green read as a gift without saying birthday or sorry, so they suit nearly anyone you'd thank.