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Welcome to my first installment of the Unscripted Photos, Valley Center, Shop Local Spotlight. A monthly feature on my blog to help support our local businesses and entrepreneurs right here in Valley Center, CA. For this first edition, I will be featuring a local with a heart for giving back to the community, and an exquisite eye for elegant and thoughtful floral artistry. I also can't think of a better day to kick it off than on the eve of Small Business Saturday! All photography by Andrea Matthies of Unscripted Photos.

There is one particular person/business, who caught my eye just the other day, and that business is Bellani Floral.  I noticed that the owner, Jenelle Brinneman, had made available for purchase some bouquets of locally grown eucalyptus and lavender in a post on Facebook.  What made these bouquets noticeable and special to me, was the fact that she was giving $5 back to the farmer who grew them, to help support him as he had become ill.  With the Thanksgiving holiday coming up, I wanted to bring a nice bouquet to my mom, as a special Thanksgiving treat, so I naturally thought of Jenelle, and Bellani Floral. I reached out to her, and arranged to pick up my Thanksgiving themed bouquet, and also a bouquet of the eucalyptus and lavender for my sister in law. I also asked if I could take some photos of her doing her thing, so that I could further spread the word about her and her business/causes. I asked to her a bit about how she started her business, and what makes her happy about it.

Jenelle and Bella of Bellani Floral Jenelle (r) and her Daughter Bella (l)

Jenelle carefully puts together a beautiful Thanksgiving bouguet

"I lost 2 brothers within 3 years, and was in banking at the time. I became lost in it & didn’t have the drive to be a banker any longer. I needed something to fill the serious void in my heart. When I lost my 2nd brother I also just broke my leg. I had so many people come help me & it made me feel so good. I was on a mission to give back."

The opportunity to give back ended up coming in bittersweet form when a member of the gym she attended became terminally ill.  It was her friend's wish to be married before she earned her angels wings. Jenelle helped organize a bridal shower at another friends' flower studio.

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"When I saw the look on her face when she walked in & saw all the flowers..I knew that’s what my calling was. The room filled with flowers was so calming & healing. Flowers heal! I started making arrangements for anyone I could, took any online class I could, studied..and started posting my work. My community embraced me, and I’m forever grateful. In 2019 I was able to leave banking."

Jenelle then started making arrangements for anyone she could, taking all the online classes she could, and really studying the craft of floral artistry and arranging. It is a small town, so soon, word got around about her beautiful arrangements as well as the causes she supports. In 2019, she was able to leave banking. She fully embraced supporting local farmers from the start..so when 2020 came around, she became their advocate for sales and marketing, and held numerous local farmer promotions to help drive sales (as the flower markets sat closed). Jenelle and her daughter Bella were two of the nicest, passionate, gracious, and generous people with hearts of gold.  I am so glad to share their story, and glad to have met them. They are my inspiration behind starting this spotlight on local Valley Center small businesses.

CS7A8138 "I’m extremely passionate about helping our local farmers. I love making people smile, it feels the void in my heart. I’m so blessed to have met so many amazing people already, that I’m writing a book “memoir of the flower lady” (that’s what people call me..I love it!)"

When I was there picking up the flowers, Jenelle's daughter Bella was also there. She helps her mom out a lot with workshops, flower delivery, and pretty much everything with the business. They both told me about how they had recently been on channel 10 news 2 times for obtaining through the help of the community and a GoFundMe campaign, thousands of flowers to be put on graves at Fort Rosecrans and Miramar National Cemetery, as well as here in town at the Valley Center Cemetery. Click here to read one of those stories

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Bellani Floral's next workshop will be focused on creating Grinch tree centerpieces which are the brainchild of Jenelle's daughter, Bella. These workshops will take place outdoors in small groups at their workspace. There will be plenty of room for people to work on their Grinch masterpieces while remaining socially distanced. These workshops begin the first week of December, 2020.

Follow Bellani Floral and Events on Facebook and Instagram to find out about upcoming workshops, farm lending initiatives, and also to purchase her beautiful bouquets. CS7A8142

It happened! The people over at Clash Music debuted Karl Blau's new video for "Falling Rain",  the first released single from the upcoming album entitled "Introducing Karl Blau".

The album was produced by grammy award nominee, Tucker Martine of Flora Recording and Playback , and will be coming out in May on Raven Marching Band Records (click on previous link to pre-order vinyl version!) here in the states, and Bella Union overseas.

In case you haven't had a chance to see it, here it is:

This ten minute long epic video was produced by Dave Matthies and Royal Malloy with lighting direction and photography by Unscripted Photos  Falling Rain also guest stars Kyle Field of Little Wings.

Field guest stars as the coffee guzzling spiritual guru who helps Karl out of the fog of his depressed reality that stems from the lack of world peace by teleporting him from his teepee and into the jungle.

We wanted to share are a few more production stills that we shot while on location at basketball legend BIll Waltons' estate, in the Matthies Media studio on green screen, as well as on the streets of Old Town, San Diego.

Karl, Kyle, and Royal take to the green screen:

Dave Matthies of Cowboy Mustache on the job:

Kyle Field and his notorious coffee cup:

Bill Walton's lovely teepee that he so graciously let us use for the day:

Stay tuned for Karl's next video premier shot on the same weekend.. I am excited to share it when it happens!!

Here is a little backstory on the project: My husband and business partner, Dave Matthies, the president of Matthies Media Inc., and owner of Cowboy Mustache, is a Skagit Valley, Washington native who currently resides in Vista, Ca with myself and our family.  He remains in contact with most of his Mt Vernon and Anacortes friends and family, many of them being musicians and artists with colorful lives. Dave's longtime friend, Royal Malloy, a former Anacortsian himself,  is a top producer and co-owner of American Chainsaws, a top ranked L.A. based production company.

Royal Malloy came to Dave with a proposal to shoot two music videos with a very talented close mutual friend, musician, and Anacortes Music Channel owner, Karl Blau. Malloy offered to fly Blau down from his home base of Anacortes, WA, to shoot the videos for Karl's upcoming release entitled "Introducing Karl Blau" (produced by Tucker Martine for Raven Marching Band Records in the U.S. and Bella Union Records in the U.K.) on location in one weekend.

Day one we shot the video for "That's How I got to Memphis," a ballad by Tom T. Hall in the neighborhood of our home in Vista, CA. 

Day two was a combination of pick up shots for "That's How I got to Memphis," and the video for "Falling Rain" (cover of a song by Link Wray). "Falling Rain" was shot mostly on the nearly city-block-long, sprawling estate of NBA Hall of Famer and announcer,  Bill Walton, in Old Town, San Diego, as well as back at the ol' Matthies ranch in Vista.

Of course we agreed to go forward with the project, and it was a successful couple of days, as well as a great time with very close friends. Enjoy a few highlights :)

Dave Matthies of Cowboy Mustache

Karl Blau walks through Old Town, San Diego

Kyle Field of Little Wings guest stars in both videos

filming the video for "Falling Rain"

Karl Blau, Jan 2016, San Diego

The Crew wraps shooting at Bill Walton's estate.

Left to right:  Dave Matthies, Kyle Field, Andrea Matthies, Karl Blau, Jacob Navarron, Bill Walton, Royal Malloy

Both the album and the videos will be out in 2016, we are so excited!