#oh my gosh i got all choked up while we were building this and amy thought i had hurt myself with the mallet

[flowerliker]

[A series of boxes are dropped off at Bryony's house, with no return address. None are particularly deep, but all are at least 60cm wide, three of them are around 1.5m long, and each weighs somewhere between 25-40kg. One of the two smaller boxes has "Open first" written on the top. Inside are two letters and a small tin, sitting on top of brown paper that conceals the rest of the contents.]

Letter 1, written in a plain, but very neat hand:

"Bryony, I hope this finds you well. I apologize for the multitude of packages, but trying to fit all of the parts into one box would have made it far too heavy. Everything is cut to pidovetail together, so a rubber mallet should be all that you need, though some wood glue wouldn't hurt matters, should you have it on hand.

"I know that you said I owed you nothing, but that does not change the fact that I simply wanted to make you something, and had the inspiration for a planter box. In gratitude, Alexander Cypress.

"P.S.: Sage wanted to send you something too, so some of his needles are in the tin. He most certainly can read, and we've begun making headway on the writing. I hope it's legible; he was very insistent that I not read it."

Letter 2, in much shakier handwriting:

"Thank you for the tea//It is very hard to be//Only good smell here

[This letter is signed with what is presumably a Leafeon's pawprint. The extra fur blurs it a bit.]

[Inside each box is a slab or post of dense hardwood, finished with a light stain. One slab is unadorned, and another has drainage holes, respectively labeled as "Back" and "Bottom". The remaining slabs all have bas-relief carvings. One side piece has a Budew, twirling around, only to end up as a Roselia upon completing his turn, and the other a Galarian Ponyta, standing with a relaxed, confident posture. The front has flowers running along the border, arcing down to form a wreath around the center. In it stand a young woman and a Sunflora, both beaming. The corner posts are bare for most of their height, but the top of each is carved into a subtly different Oddish.]

[A series of photos of the planter box fully constructed—Bryony has taken pictures from a few angles to make sure everyone can see all the details. It's set up in her plant nursery, against a wall made of floor-to-ceiling windows, but it's too dark to see much of the yard outside; this clearly turned into an evening project. A few potted plants of different sizes sit in the planter box, and there's a little potted orange tree with gold gift wrap still around the base standing right next to it. Some of the photos feature Pokémon wandering about it: a group of Oddish stacked on top of each other try to help a Roselia climb up into the planter; a Galarian Ponyta sits in the near background, his head lifted to watch from where he's curled up by a stove box containing a shiny silver Slugma, who seems less interested in all the activity. In one photo taken earlier in the day in the process of unpacking, a Sunflora standing in front of stacks of boxes and hardwood looks at the camera and eagerly points at her matching carving with one leaf.]

oh my goodness look at this!!!!! i got my nice camera out for the first time in a while so everyone could see all the little details, i feel like every time i look i notice something new!! amy and i spent a bunch of today dealing with the inkay situation but as soon as we had a moment i finally opened everything up and then roped them into helping me build it hehe, but i think i maybe could have done it on my own if i had to even though i am notoriously not very good at building furniture… not that it was not nice to have the help but everything really did just fit right together!!!

i put a couple of herb pots in it for now because i cannot bear to see it empty and unused, especially since i have it set up so it is the first thing i get to see when i go into the nursery, but i am going to wait until next month to actually start planting anything in it so i can fill it with sunflowers 🌻 my favorite flowers should go in my favorite planter!!!

oh my goodness i don't even know what to say, just thank you does not feel like enough. i think this is one of the kindest most thoughtful things anyone has ever done for me. it's beautiful, alexander, i don't even know how to tell you how much i love it. thank you so so much.

oh my gosh and send sage my thanks too!!! i guess it should be expected that he is so thoughtful too hehe but i am very grateful for the gift and the letter!!! i could read it just fine and i am so so proud of all his hard work and progress, and i will not say anything else out of respect for him and his secrets hehe. i cannot wait to read more of his work!!!

thank you both so much!!! 💛💛💛