As part of the American Rescue Plan, Congress pledged $4 billion in debt relief to disadvantaged farmers.
24.06.2024 - 08:21 / ramblinginthegarden.wordpress.com / Cathy
Monday vases following any Sunday garden opening usually take advantage of flowers used for table decoration, which in June inevitably means sweet peas. However, being even more prepared this year due to an early group visit, I had time to think ahead and made my vase on Saturday.
The starting point actually came out of the preparation, after pulling out some purple linaria that had seeded into a paving crack. In small quantities this is a useful plant, but becomes annoyingly less useful if it starts to get out of hand which it successfully does, as it readily pops up both in and out of gardens throughout the UK. I grew the pretty pink version of this from seed given by Cathy of Words and Herbs, but it disappeared after one season, presumably kicked into touch by what is clearly the more dominant variety. I was about to consign the plant to the green waste bin, but gave it a last-minute reprieve and used the flowering stems as a starting point for the vase.
A quick search for other purple or purplish blooms brought together clary sage ‘Oxford Blue’ and Ageratum ‘Blue Horizon’ (the latter a recommendation from Chiltern Seeds) from the cutting beds, seed-sown Verbena rigida, Veronica gentianoides from the blue & white border, distinctive bobbled spikes of Salvia ‘Purple Rain’ and hazy spent flower heads of Thalictrum ‘Black Stockings’, the latter providing the perfect finishing touch to a very satisfactory vase. It always amazes me how easily a vase of blooms can become so much more than the sum of its individual parts, more often than not with very little effort on the creator’s part.
Even a solitary stem in a jam jar is elevated by the combination, so if you would like to join us on IAVOM with a simple statement vase like
As part of the American Rescue Plan, Congress pledged $4 billion in debt relief to disadvantaged farmers.
I was planning on taking the contents of whatever vase I created to Julie, whose Pilates class I have been attending for 12 years but who is stepping down as of today; however, she is poorly and unable to take the class so I will arrange to see her with a fresh bunch when she is well enough to mix with people again. I shall miss her weekly classes, but have always enjoyed those taken by her replacement, who has covered for illness and holidays and teaches a slightly different style, so all is not lost.
Happy Monday GPODers!
A harmonious Dorset rose garden designed by Isabel and Julian Bannerman
Photosynthesis is one of life’s most quintessential recipes. Plants combine sunlight, water and carbon dioxide to produce oxygen, along with nutrients the organisms need to grow.
I have been watching and admiring the white antirrhinum, A ‘Liberty Classic White’, in the cutting beds for a few weeks, not wanting to cut any stems until all our garden visitors had departed. Now that they have indeed all gone, I was at liberty to use the stems in today’s vase, where they form the mainstay of an all-white arrangement.
Honeysuckle (Lonicera periclymenum) is one of the easiest plants to find in the wild, since its strong, sweet scent hangs on the air. Native to most of Europe, it is a common sight and smell in our woodlands and hedgerows in summer, twining itself around trees and scrub and luring a wide variety of wildlife. In A Midsummer Night's Dream, Oberon describes Titania's sleeping place as 'quite overcanopied with luscious woodbine'. It is certainly a plant fit for a queen, since each of the flowerheads resembles a crown of cream and gold, formed of a ring of tubular blooms.
Audrey Scheck knows her way around a kitchen. As an interior designer based in Austin, Texas, she often puts her stylish touch on kitchen remodels by creating custom design plans that reflect each owner. From down-to-the-studs renovations to arranging the final touches of decor, Scheck is there for it all. That’s why we turned to her to reveal the common decorating mistakes she sees in the heart of a home. Read on eight decorating mistakes you may be making in your kitchen—and how to fix them.
Do Black Swallowtail Butterflies Eat Carrots?
I have chosen roses to go in my Monday vase this week because they are the most floriferous blooms in the garden at this point in mid-June. There are two varieties, growing together in the gallery border, and both seem to have done better this year than before – behind the gallery fence is the woodland which blocks sun from the south, so the roses only get the morning and late afternoon sun. However, our neighbours cut some of the lower branches from their huge mature beech over the winter and perhaps this allows more light to filter through.
Fuchsias originate from South America