I was trying to avoid tulips for today’s IAVOM, as they could easily become a mainstay for many weeks; however, these creamy tulips were tucked out of the way where they mightn’t otherwise be seen and, like last week’s fiery contribution, they are also a bit of an enigma. They are growing in the cutting beds where they were planted around 10 years ago with the sole purpose of cutting them. Presumably, they flowered in the first year of planting but, although there has been foliage in some of the intervening years, I don’t think there have been any further blooms until now. My guess is that these are mature bulblets from the original bulbs, now large enough to flower: I have only picked the two blooms that were in full flower, but there are others to come. They may be ‘Exotic Emperor’, which I have bought periodically over the years.
Joining the tulips are sprigs of a reliable but straggly wallflower, not quite strawberry red, but in combination with the tulips perhaps we can get away with the title and the prop of a strawberry-themed knitting pattern, for an outfit I knitted for my first grandchild, The Poppet, nearly ten years ago. Sadly, I am not convinced she ever wore it, which would be a shame, as the overall effect was really pleasing (although the pattern was badly worked out with the yellow ‘seeds’ being on even rows, meaning there were a lot of ends to be sown in – in hindsight, a wonderful thing, I could have used two separate balls of yellow…).
If you have tulips, or anything else plucked from your garden or nearby, to create a vase just to bring yourself pleasure or that you would like to share with us on IAVOM, then consider adding links to and from this post.
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Having decided to spare a few allium (probably A hollandicum) for today’s vase, I sought other material on the purple spectrum, cutting Geranium phaeum ‘Raven’, a deep purply-blue aquilegia and foliage from Persicaria ‘Red Dragon’ – but the combination just didn’t seem to work. Glancing up at the wisteria W floribunda ‘Multijuga’ in all its glory, it occurred to me that the purple hints in the racemes were on the same spectrum as the allium – would they last in a vase? I have no idea, but I decided to give them a try.
Having cut spent flowering stems from all the hellebores over the weekend, amassing a large trugful of them, rather than compost them all I decided to use several stems in today’s vase. Not only was it the last opportunity this year to use hellebores in a vase, but this time I could also be sure, with seedpods well-swollen, that the stems will remain upstanding, unlike vases when the blooms were fresher. I wish I could tell you what colour the original blooms were, but I can’t; now, they are a very pale green with dark speckled centres, giving them a kind of vintage appearance.
Averting my eyes from the tulips which were shouting “Pick me! Pick me!” as I walked past, I headed towards the bottom end of the garden to pick some of the marauding Spanish bluebells that have sneaked their way in under/over/round the fence. The impact of bluebells in the garden has really registered in recent days, with the uninvited guests and the more local residents joining forces to provide by far and away the biggest splash of blue in the garden out of all the seasons. There may be little patches of blue from spring bulbs and isolated spots in the summer months, but bluebell season is something else and the splashes will only get larger and more widespread as time goes on, with even the English bluebells popping up in other parts of the garden than the woodland. By picking the Spanish bluebells, however, I can at least try and restrict their desire for dominance!
If you want to repurpose your old glass kitchenware, just Grow these Purple Plants in jars, bottles, and vases. Now, you may wonder that why “Purple”? Purple, the color of royalty and luxury will vibe up your space to the next level. Beyond its aesthetic appeal, it will infuse your space with positive energy and a calming aura.
Technical issues will keep this post brief as a mammoth Windows ‘update’ and ‘cleaning’ of my laptop yesterday evening would have kept me up way past my bedtime otherwise!
I promised you tulips today, but even I wasn’t expecting these ones, remnants from a previous planting in a pot now filled with Carex ‘Everillo’. I can remember buying some fiery tulips two or three years ago, but have no idea why I would have put them in that particular pot, as their bright and brash colouring would have necessitated a planting location near the bold borders. Nevertheless, there they were, pushing aside the grass and cocking a snook at the main borders filling up with foliage of plants that will in due course have pink and purple blooms, so I had no qualms in cutting short their exhibitionism.
As was clear from many Six on Saturday posts this weekend, spring is very much on its way in the UK and some other northern hemisphere gardens, so spotting signs of it is a doddle, with spring bulbs very much to the fore. It was only after I snipped the contents for today’s vase that I remembered my intention to pick some of the double Narcissus ‘Tête Boucle’ from the baskets usually hanging at the front of the house, but removed to allow installation of external installation (delayed numerous times, unsurprisingly due to the weather) and now languishing largely unseen at the side of the property instead. Perhaps they will still look as good next week?
Sadly, there were neither blue skies nor sunshine yesterday, when I created this vase, and if I had checked the forecast when I first got up I would have searched for and picked blooms, popped them in a vase and photographed them first thing, when it was at least dry. As it was, however, with other commitments later, I found myself dashing out in the rainy late afternoon to find something I could quickly cut and display and photograph.