Send Same Day Flowers to Lilyfield, Home, Work or Care Room

You know the house, but not whether anyone's home on a weekday. If they work in the city, their office is often the surer address. If it's the house, put their mobile in the notes: our florists tell us they ring it before leaving flowers at an empty house. Choose from our 40th birthday flowers, or the best-selling birthday flowers if the age doesn't matter.

Anna's call: add a line to the card asking for room-temperature water in the vase. It climbs a freshly cut stem faster than cold water from the tap.

Mum or Nan is at Uniting Aldersgate on Fredbert Street, or in rehab at Balmain Hospital on Booth Street, and you can't get there this week. Aldersgate is a small home and it looks after residents with dementia. In our experience, flowers to either place go to the front desk and staff carry them in.

I learnt why at St Martha's on Leisure Drive, Banora Point, in 2008. Keypad on the door. I stood outside with a box of pink roses for ten minutes while a resident waved at me through the glass. I waved back. Neither of us had the code. A carer came past, read the name on the card and walked the box straight to the right room. Without a full name and room number, that's the step that stalls. Try our thinking of you flowers or 90th birthday flowers. Card idea: "Thinking of you, Mum. I'll ring Sunday."

Anna, on rooms with dementia care

For a room with dementia care, send a box arrangement. It sits low, won't tip if the table gets bumped, and the foam holds its own water. Stick to stems they'd know from a garden, like roses and daisies.

The notice says a Requiem at St Joseph's on Victoria Road in Rozelle, burial at Rookwood, and the family back home in Lilyfield afterwards. Decide first whether the flowers are for the church or for the family at home. For the church, put the service time and the name of the person who has died in the notes, and the florist works back from that time. Our wreaths and sheaths are made for the service, our sympathy flowers for the home for the days after. Card idea: "With love, and so sorry we can't be there."

A sheath is built to lie flat on a casket and a wreath to stand on an easel. A tall vase of loose stems has nowhere safe to sit in a church. For a Catholic Requiem, white lilies with white or soft pink roses are the traditional pairing.

A new neighbour, a thank-you for minding the dog, or no reason at all. Our florist's choice range was made for these, and Anna has a view on which one.

The Florists Choice Bright Mixed Bunch. With no theme to match, the florist is free to use whatever is freshest in the cool room that morning, and the freshest stems are the ones that last.