Al Fresco Dining in the Patio Garden
Even when it’s humid out, dinner tastes better on the patio!
~ Deborah Trickett
Great Alternatives for Shade Garden Plants
During a recent shopping trip to one of my favorite wholesale nurseries, I overheard a woman (who I assumed was a designer) explain to her client, “Well you have shade options here…basically begonias and begonias.” I had to bite my tongue. Which I do frequently. For example, at one of the big box stores when I saw the person in line in front of me with a container and a bag of garden soil. My tongue wanted to say “Excuse me, you cannot use that soil in a container, it won’t drain well.” But one look at my daughter and I bit my tongue. Apparently being, what I consider “helpful and friendly” is actually “weird and embarrassing.” So I also bit my tongue when I heard another one of the salespeople remark to a customer, “Why you can put a mountain of this granular bug killer on your lawn and it won’t harm anything.” Really? Jaw clenched I retreated to the plumbing aisle.
But back to shade options. Begonias are fine, as are impatiens, but is that really the only material the aforementioned designer could offer her client?
Had she never heard of coleus?
Garden Quote: Closest to Being Present at Creation
“I think this is what hooks one to gardening: it is the closest one can come to being present at creation.”
– Phyllis Theroux
Garden Quote – Patriotism
A man’s country is not a certain area of land, of mountains, rivers, and woods, but it is a principle; and patriotism is loyalty to that principle.
~George William Curtis
A Plethora of Pots
May and June have been a crazy, busy time; a “hair-on-fire” time for those of us in the gardening business. Or as my kids say a GYO time, which stands for Get-Your-Own, as in dinner.
I have lost track of the number of summer pots I have planted over the last two weeks. Each pot I planted was unique. While I know using a formula, for sun or shade, for instance, would make things go more quickly I would rather create custom work which reflects the style and preferences of my clients. I have one client who only wants green and white. Her container featured spathiphyllum, white verbena and New Guinea impatiens, helichrysum and lamiastrum.
A new client with a roof deck liked only vibrant colors – no pale pinks or lavenders for her. Some croton in her planters anchored the “hot” color palette on the sunny side of the deck….
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