Bouquets for Monday August 31st, 2009

I have lots of different flowers to work with right now so I'm able to make more different color combinations. Herre are 5 different ones though there were probably 10 different color combinations today.

I used only dark red and dark purple in this first one. This might not be what you'd want if you were depressed but one of my daytime customers said, "Wow! I like that" when I handed it to her. The dark purple flowers are lisianthus, the small red ones are 'Serenade' china asters and the large red ones are zinnias. A single dark red snapdragon spike adds an another variety to the shapes.

This birght bouquet of orange and white might be exactly what you'd want if you were feeling depressed. The large orange flowers are zinnias and the small orange ones are butterfly weed. The whites are lisianthus and a large white dahlia, and the greenery is artemesia.

This yellow and white that is also very cheery. A yellow snapdragon is surrounded by yellow lilies, white lisianthus, goldenrod (not yet open), and yellow zinnias.

I always like using complementary colors. Here purple lisianthus are paired with salmon zinnias and agastache.

Fall is definitely coming in this last bouquet of yellow and rusty oranges. The small daisies are helenium, combined with sunflowers, zinnias and dahlias. The cattail spikes are an ornamental millet called 'Purple Majesty'.

Bouquets for Friday August 21st

Someone at the Open House mentioned that she has especially enjoyed the one and two color bouquets I've been doing this year, so this one made of all different shades of purple is for you, , Karen. The delphinium is a rebloom on one of the new plants this year, along with lavender statice, blue 'Cinderella' lisianthus and purple aster 'Serenade'

Here is another bicolor combining reds with white. the white lisianthus actually have a very faint rose rim on the petals but you probably can't see it in the picture. The big dahlias are 'Naomi', the china aster is red 'Serenade', and the snapdragon is red 'Opus'

Bouquets for Friday August 7th 2009

I have lots of lisianthus available now and making pretty bouquets is easy. The first bouquet is red and white. The oriental lily is 'Dizzy' - quite a bit more striking than 'Stargazer'. The lisiathus are white with a rose rim and the dark red dahlia is 'Naomi'. A single white delphinium is th eonly other flower.
Everyone who has gotten these blue (or purple), white and silver bouquets has really liked them so I will keep making them while the flowers hold out.

All yellow and white in the next bouquet. This is another orental lily with no pink or red in it called 'Time Out'. The double yellow flowers are Rudbeckia laciniata, sometimes sold as 'Golden Glow'. Yellow statice and white lisianthus fill in the rest.

I am almost out of Bells of Ireland and was only able to make one green and white bouquet like this. The lisianthus here are 'Magic Green' - basically a white with a green eye, and the dahlia is 'Center Court'. There are also sprigs of Sweet Annie (Artemesia annua) for foliage.

Last is a bouquet with no lisianthus containing a mix of Rudbeckia laciniata, snapdragons, yellow statice, zinnias and Rudbeckia hirta

Bouquets for Monday July 27th 2009

A few new flowers this week. The lily below is scented like an oriental lily but has coloring like an asiatic. The orientals usually have only crimson and purple shades of red. This one is called 'Red Dutch'. The bouquet also contains grass 'Purple Majesty', yellow statice, rudbeckia and coreopsis, and zinnias.

One of my customers who received a bouquet like the one below said it was her favorite so far. It contains silver artemesia, blue echinops, white liatris, white lisianthus, blue ageratum, white a blue phlox and white feverfew.

This bouquet is all pink, red and white - kind of like Valentine's Day.

This bouquet contains salmon lisianthus with salmon zinnias, Opus 'Appleblossom' snapdragons and Bells of Ireland. There is also a 'Coral Charm' peony on the right from the fridge.

Bouquets for Monday July 20th

I took a bunch of pictures this week. I was actually short of flowers because I have almost no heliopsis or gooseneck flowers this year to use as yellow and white fillers. had to use some commercial chrysanthemums but planted new heliopsis this spring and divided the gooseneck flowers today, so I should be OK next year.

The first one combines pink larkspur with purple phlox 'Laura', Bells of Ireland and a big white globe thistle at the top. The salmon sweet william is from the 'Sweet' series, an annual type (first year flowering).

The second one is a standard set of colors - red, orange and yellow. A bit different because of the big dark gold or brown amaranth 'Hot Biscuits' in the center. I am not sure how I feel about amaranths - I like the color of this one but they always look a bit coarse to me. You can also see the first orange zinnia of the year along with a quilled rudbeckia 'Chim Chiminee' on the left. The red flower in the upper right is a crocosima. This bouquet also had centaurea and achillea 'Terra Cotta'

This purple bouquet has the first liatris of the year with a light purple phlox called (I think) 'Blue Boy'. You can see some peonies in there that were cut in the first week of June. I still have a bunch in the fridge and need to use them pretty quickly. The big lily is 'Triumphator'

I wanted to include a picture of this yellow-orange-white bouquet because the delphinium is one of the 'Green Twist' delphiniums I got from Dowdeswell Delphiniums in New Zealand. It is a bit hard to see in the picture but the individual flowers are very double and edged with a bit of green.

Also wanted to include this one because it is a color combination I had not tried before - yellow-orange-green. Kind of fun. The grass spikes you see in some of these are Northern sea oats (Chasmanthium latifolium).

Bouquets for Friday July 10th

I have not been doing a very good job of keeping up this year. I liked this one because it was a color combination I don't use often - all purple and red. The purple phlox with the white eye is 'Laura' and the raspberry colored mondarda is 'Raspberry Wine'. You can also see a couple purple balloon flowers in the upper right. the other flowerrs are larkspurs and a lavender delphinium.

Bouquets for Monday July 6th

A few new flowers for Monday - green Bells of Ireland (Molucella laevis), orange perennial butterfly weed (Asclepias tuberosa). This bouquet combines salmon pink larkspur and clarkia with 'Appleblossom' snapdragon, 'Suncrest' lily and Bells of Ireland.

This second one is all hot colors - bright yellow snapdragons with orange butterfly weed and red monarda.

This third one combines purple larkspur - both the spike and open branched kinds - with an orange lily, orange butterfly weed and a few purple erigeron.

Bouquets for Friday July 3rd

I made a bunch more red-white-blue bouquets for the holiday but I posted pictures of those Monday. Many other people received pink-purple or coral-white bouquets like these on Friday. Most of the flowers have already been used this year. There are purple larkspur, pink phlox, erigeron in the pink-ppurple bouquet and coral and white bicolor snapdragons and clarkia in the white and coral bouquet, along with a coral lily.

Bouquets for Monday June 29th

Quite a few fun colors and flowers this Monday. In honor of the upcoming holiday I did a few red, white and blue bouquets using blue delphiniums, red lilies and monarda and white feverfew. One of my Monday business customers said the monarda looked like fireworks!

I also made quite a few using just purple and pink. The purples are clustered bellflowers and another bellflower I only know as 'Kent Belle'. It may be some kind of hybrid, I don't know. The pinks include delphinium, phlox, astilbe and clarkia.

Also did a few apricot and purple like this one using apricot lilies with the same purple bellflowers plus achillea 'Terra Cotta'

About half a dozen bouquets were blue and yellow. Most of my heliopsis died over the winter so I won't have many. I started more this year but I should have done it last year. You can also see a yellow centaurea, white annual gypsophila and yarrows.

I almost never make anything containing only two kinds of flowers, but I made quite a few bouquets containing only delphiniums and clarkia - basically salmon and blue.

Bouquets for Friday June 26th

Each year I grow cut flowers I learn something new and (I hope) produce better and better bouquets. Mostly this involves learning how to grow things, though somtimes it involves learning how to harvest things for better vase life or something like that. It took me several years to be able to grow decent Clarkia with stems long enough to be useful. The trick was to get them into the ground as soon as possible before they get pot-bound. This year I planted them out exceptionally early under a low tunnel and have been rewarded with probably the nicest ones I have ever grown. The bouquet below has salmon and white clarkia combined with delphiniums and sweet william. There's also a single stem of white phlox in the middle.

If you follow this blog at all you can see I use maybe a dozen different color schemes but create them with different flowers throughout the year. One I haven't used yet this year combines purple with dusty rose and green-ish lilies. The little pink daisies are fleabane (or more prettily, Erigerion).

This next bouquet is the same all pastel color scheme I made a bunch of on Monday. The only difference is this time I was able to add some white astilbes.

Bouquets for June 22, 2009

Lots of delphiniums this week but they will probably all be gone in one more week. I have posted so many with blue and purple so here are a couple different looking bouquets I made with white delphiniums. The first is white, purple and coral with the purple coming from clustered bellflowers and the coral from Heuchera (coral bells) and 'Newport Pink' dianthus.

The second one combines white with orange trollius, melon colored lilies and yellow yarrow. The colors make me think of citrus.

The last one is all pastels with silver artemesia. The pink daisies are erigerion.

I also made a number of lavender/apricot and blue/yellow bouquets this week.

Bouquets for Monday June 15th

The bouquets were really nice this week, I'm enjoying having the bellflowers which are new this year. The first one is fairly typical of what I do at this time of year - blue with pink and red.

The next is purple delphinium and bell flowers with salmon and scarlet sweet william. There are a few sprigs of coral bells and green lady's mantle to add some airiness.

Last is white, scarlet, orange and yellow. The orange flowers are trollius, the yellow is yarrow, the scarlet is sweet william and the white is a delphinium and white peonies.

Bouquets for Friday June 12th

When you grow perennials for cut flowers there is a delay of at least a year from the time you plant the seed to when you actually start harvesting flowers. Last year I mentioned starting peach leaved bell flowers and here they finally are - the white "bell' flowers to the right of the delphinium. The others are the usual flowers for this season - sweet william, peonies, lady's mantle. I really love all of these.

As gorgeous as pink-blue-white bouquets are at this time of year, it gets monotonous if you can't see something else.This next bouquet contains salmon pink 'Newport Pink' dianthus, scarlet dianthus, coral bells, and white lily, peonies and delphinium.

Bouquets for Monday June 1st and Friday June 5th

Delphiniums and peonies are coming in now. The hybrid delphinium 'Aurora' that I've been growing for the past couple years blooms a week or 10 days earlier than 'Clear Springs'. This is nice as long as I remember to keep replanting some 'Clear Springs' to extned the season.

The spikes of 'Aurora' are almost a little too tall for the size of bouquets I make. This bouquet has some of my favorite flowers of the season - delphiniums, peonies, forced lilies and scarlet sweet william.

This second bouquet contains forced lilies, 'Moonshine' yarrow, sweet william and some green lady's mantle. One of my customers mentioned that the lady's mantle, "doesn't smell too great", though I don't really notice it.

Bouquets for Friday May 28th

Have really fallen behind in posting pictures this season. The first bouquet has salmon lily, purple alliums, purple clustered bellflowers, coral bells, shasta daisies and red single peony.

This second bouquet has blue baptisa, shasta daisies, white peonies and a few commercial yellow mums.

Bouquets for Monday May 25th

These bouquets have commercial chrysanthemums and statice but also include the first peonies and forced lilies. The brilliant pink peony is 'Paula Fay'. I don't have any other peonies that are quite that color. the Wild's catalog says somthing like the color, "carries well across the garden" which it certainly does. The big blue and white stippled iris is (I think) 'Stepping Out'.

The orange lily with the black blotches is an asiatic lily called 'Loreto'. I have not grown it before but it is certainly striking.

Bouquets for Friday May 22nd

I've been really bad about taking pictures this year. About half the bouquets last Friday look like this. The chrysanthemums and statice are commercial flowers. The large white flowers on the lower left are double file viburnum. The arching flower with the varigated leaves is varigated solomon's seal. You can also seen allium 'Purple Sensation' and perennial bachelor's button (Centaurea montana).