The greenhouse is so beautiful all year round, but it’s especially so in the height of the holiday season. In fact, sometimes there are so many flowers and new plants coming in almost daily that they are literally everywhere – on tables, on the floor around tables, and anywhere we can find a spare space. Never let it be said we don’t have a little something for everyone!
Start with the bulbs of the season…paperwhites for fragrance and amaryllis for elegance. Paperwhite bulbs are readily available and so easy to plant in potting soil or a pretty bowl with pea gravel and water. We’ll also have plenty each week from growers, already planted, up and ready to bloom.
An elegant amaryllis is a wonder gift…
Amaryllis bulbs are notoriously tricky to time; they will come up when they’re good and ready, thank you very much! If you want an amaryllis for a certain date, it’s really best to buy them a week ahead already budded.
Many years ago I promised a customer that, of course, I could have 12 amaryllis, all in full bloom, on a certain date for a big party…oh, did I sweat those! I thought I had all my ducks in a row until the date I received them from the grower. They were beautiful, with tall strong stems and large….buds. (They had done their best to get them to the right stage of bud/bloom.)
The party was in less than a week, so I put them in the warmest spot in the greenhouse and worked some juju to make them bloom. Thankfully, they cooperated, and my customer didn’t know how close she came to having beautiful amaryllis….in bud. (Wait a minute, who am I kidding? I would have been scouring the city for 12 amaryllis in bloom!)
A ‘Shooting Star’ hydrangea…
In the last five years or so, hydrangeas have become a popular holiday flower. Growers force these into bloom for the season, and they really are spectacular on their own, in an arrangement for a party, or to give as a gift. If I would tell anyone the one thing to remember when they receive or purchase a hydrangea for themselves, it is this – please keep them watered. If they’re allowed to dry out one too many times, there will be brown spots on the otherwise beautiful blooms.
Phaelenopsis orchid…
Regal cymbidium orchids make quite a statement…
We have orchids every month of the year, but their beauty is particularly enticing through the holidays. They add a touch of elegance to any setting, beginning with the most common and easy to grow phaelenopsis, or moth orchid. Through December we also carry the impressive cymbidium orchids, with their fans of leaves and huge, drooping buds and blooms in shades of pink, yellow and white. Or you may want to try a diminutive but long lasting lady slipper orchid, whose leaves are often as beautiful as the blooms.
And the list goes on…with the sturdy and bright rieger begonias, the trick to growing them well is to give them plenty of light and go easy on the water. Be diligent in pulling off old fading blooms, and they will reward you with many weeks of color!
Pretty cyclamen…
Cyclamen are another wonderful winter bloomer, flourishing in cool temperatures and going dormant as temperatures warm in the spring. Be very careful not to overwater (It’s best to water these from the bottom.) and keep them in as cool a spot as you can.
Ornamental oregano and lemon cypress…
These are just a few of the beautiful plants gracing the greenhouse throughout the holidays, Many others are grown more for foliage or scent, such as ornamental oregano, golden lemon cypress, myrtle, and, of course the poinsettia, a mainstay of the season. There’s simply nothing prettier than a greenhouse in full bloom!
I hope you have the opportunity to visit, as the greenhouse is a visual feast for the senses, awash in all the colors and scents of the season….
The emphasis is on foliage, though, and I’ve included curly parsley for it’s fresh green color, a small blue fescue grass, and a shade loving heuchera for this planting. Holdovers from the summer are aspidistra, which I thin out each season, and a tiny leaf green ivy. After planting, I added birch branches to add more height and winter interest. (Branches are an easy way to get color in planters during the holiday – red twig dogwood branches would also be pretty.) While it looks a bit top heavy with the tall aspidistra at first, the parsley and heuchera will add fullness to the composition as it grows in. I’m also trying the Cool Wave white trailing pansies here this year, hoping they get enough sun to bloom well.
This fall Pardis asked if I would also take a look at the planters at Bottega, their other wonderful restaurant.
Autumn inspires us! The past month we’ve been designing with thoughts of fall…a copper container, a beautiful basket, a heavy stone trough, and even something as simple as a wooden box made wonderful starting pieces for a few of them.
This wooden box arrangement was done for a garden club – the customer brought in the antlers! This one was a fun change of pace. Those antlers didn’t want to stay put, and the box was a tad rickety…it reminds us that each day may bring different and interesting challenges!
But there’s also another important point coming to light because of this online article. It seems some people think buying “local” includes large national chains that are anything but local, though they might be right down the road.
I’m usually the last person anyone wants to ask about apps for personal devices, but this one is definitely special. Dr. Allan Armitage is well known in horticultural circles as being the authority on annuals and perennials, and developed and maintains the Trial Gardens at UGA where new plants from throughout the world are evaluated for heat and humidity performance. His bio is extensive, and you can take a look at it on the app, but suffice it to say he’s received many, many awards for teaching, writing and research.
We look forward to fall with its autumn hues glowing on gorgeous 
Bittersweet, arranged in a classic urn, gives us the quintessential look of fall. This piece is quite large, but the same effect can be achieved in a simple vase just as easily. I used dry foam with moss and added gourds to complete the arrangement.
Swan gourds here are grouped in a basket lined with moss and angel vine. If you let your imagination go, you might see an aviary family under the branch of a tree. Or, you might just see a natural composition encircled and overhung by bittersweet. There’s no wrong way to interpret this!
Halloween will be here soon, and Saturday, October 26th, we’re having a 
One of the filler plants I used was a tiny grass, Acorus minimus – all the acorus love moisture so it should do well. I rounded out the filler plants with a few ferns and another bog plant called Syngonanthus chrysanthus ‘Mikado’. This is a definite test since we know next to nothing about this plant; however, the fountain basin should give it the boggy conditions it is supposed to prefer!
This summer’s wet, cool weather might have kept many of you out of your gardens, but we’ve managed to stay busy in the greenhouse putting together arrangements filled with orchids, succulents, houseplants, and so much more…here’s a peek at some of them. We regularly have folks who stop in just to see what we’ve been working on! All of these arrangements are composed of live plants, no cut flowers here.
Finally, the silver container was given in memory of someone…the longlasting and low maintenance houseplants of trailiing pepperomia and cryptanthus make excellent companions. It’s gratifying, also, to know that whoever is on the receiving end will be able to enjoy this longer than a fresh flower arrangement could ever hope to last.
I’m not quite sure I’ve been living in the Southeast this summer…plentiful rain and decent temperatures – (Though it looks like the heat is finally returning.) this has been Alabama in August?!
But, if your garden and beds are struggling…think about where you’d like to see marigolds, ornamental peppers, late season salvias, and, further down the road, lettuce, asters and cool season herbs – we’ll have transplants of parsley, thyme (Look for the lemon variegated thyme which looks beautiful with green or red lettuce and marigolds.) dill and cilantro too.
For all of you 
Some people have asked why we don’t carry fairies and other inhabitants for our miniature gardens. For us, the garden is the key – creating a miniature garden world with plants that actually will grow for you…along with some judicious clipping when needed. (Fairies are there in spirit, not seen, and, if the garden has the magic of the creator’s touch, of course they’ll come.)
These miniature gardens have really struck a chord for adults and kids alike, and it’s so much fun to see the delight by adults and excitement of little ones as they browse (and play with) the tiny creations that can be used in their own gardens. Of course, any activity that stimulates imagination is certainly worthwhile! For children, it’s a make believe world; for adults it’s an outlet to grow plants in a different way.
All was well until the night the little girl had a sleepover party with a couple of her friends…you might well imagine where this story is going! Somehow the miniature garden, which she kept in her bedroom, was completely up-ended in the middle of the bed, an utter mishmash of soil, plants,pea gravel, stones and little accessories. It must have been like Humpty Dumpty falling off the wall in the fairytale! We helped rework the little miniature garden, and hopefully that little girl is still happily raking her pea gravel “path”…
Not long ago a parent, her daughter, and the girl’s little brother came in. The mother marched to the counter with the little boy and said that he needed to buy, with his own money, a stone for his sister’s miniature garden. Puzzled, I asked what kind of stone he needed. Well, the mother said, her daughter had a stone with the words “My Garden” written on it in her miniature garden. Evidently the little boy had turned it around and scrawled “bathroom” on the back! Of course, the boy’s sister wasn’t having any of that in her garden. So, we found the perfect stone, wrote “My Garden” on it for the little girl, and the little boy brought out his money to pay for it. Before they left, the mother gave the little boy the stone that he’d written on. Much later we found it hidden in the miniature garden displays and had a good laugh….he didn’t want it either!
Some of the fun things we’ve gotten in recently include a pair of ghosts (It’s never too early to begin thinking about Halloween!), wooden soda bottle crates with soda bottles, a wine basket with wine bottles, a metal tub (just right to put the wine and soda bottles in!), tiny turtles, frogs and one very fat cat, some pretty urns, a very realistic Celtic cross, a stone walking bridge, a triple trellis and more. And there will be additional miniature garden items coming in down the road too. It’s a good idea to pop in every now and then to see what’s new.
This post is all about relaxing in your garden. Yes, I said relaxing…it’s late summer and the garden is buzzing with life – or should be. Hopefully we’ve helped you create the perfect habitat for beneficial and beautiful insects and other critters. Take a stroll every so often and really see all that’s happening in their home.
I’ve also seen a few swallowtail butterflies – graceful beacons of midsummer, moving from pentas to zinnia to dahlia and back -.and one that had somehow torn its wing and that I found the next day in tatters in one of my beds. The circle of life continues…
I somehow captured the most perfect shot of a honeybee going in for a landing on a poppy this past spring. We need to be mindful of the bees…I’m thankful when I see them happily moving from one bloom to another on the vitex in June or the salvias in August.
With 2013 beginning with a wet, cool spring and the rain continuing into early summer, it seemed like we’d been transported into a different universe than Alabama, didn’t it? All the rain may have caused some complacency – everything seems so much lusher than it usually is this time of year…now the heat is here, though, and it seems certain we’ll be entering our usual summer pattern of hit and miss rain showers with lots of warmth and humidity…
Established plantings in your landscape should be doing well, but be aware that new plantings of shrubs, trees and perennials will need supplemental watering this first summer – pay attention to them. The requirement for new plantings is an inch of water each week.