Category Archives: Flowers

If spring wants to take her time in making an entrance, I can respect that. But that doesn’t mean I won’t push and prod and drag her ass into gear in whatever manner possible. The only sure-fire way I know of healing my winter-torn heart is to visit the local nursery and surround myself with the moist heat of a greenhouse and the fresh palette of spring blooms and foliage. Faddegon’s provides just such a respite from the lingering snow and cold.

I walked quickly past all the Easter decorations, warily keeping an eye out for an Easter-Bunny-in-training. These are perilous times. This season’s seed packets were already on display – a happy sign of good things to come. I held my breath past the fertilizer section, then descended a few steps into the first greenhouse, where palms delicately draped their fronds, and the trendy terrariums collected their drops of dew for the smallest ferns.

Bright splotches of color exploded around me as seasonal primroses turned their sunny countenances upward to the sky. I breathed in the humid air and surveyed the surroundings, so rich with green and freshness. It was the scent and scene of life. The Living. It made my heart glad, and that should be enough until the outside catches up.

Happy harbinger of spring! This is a red witch hazel, blooming in Boston long before it will bloom in upstate New York ~ well, perhaps not that long, but long enough. At the tail-end of winter, the days crawl slowly by as we bide our time waiting for the sun. There is nothing new about this post, as I usually post the parade of witch hazel blooms as they start to burst; it’s the first spot of color after a long stretch of barren and depressing surroundings.

Usually I despise repeating myself, but when that repetition is of such a happy tradition I’m glad to suspend my derision. The earliest signs of spring are always welcome, no matter how tried and true.

As a Virgo, I’m a creature of habit. I like order and consistent schedules. The blooming of witch hazel satisfies all that, as well as my love of warmer weather. Soon it will be time for the first tour of the garden ~ a time to assess winter damage, to remind me of where we last left off, to inspire the plans of summer. It shall be a good time indeed.

Things look different in the night.

Shadows play tricks.

Colors shift shade. 

This bouquet of stock is quite purple in the day, when the light is bright and tinged with whatever blue we get from the sky. At night, however, and in the warm amber glow of a lamp, it changes to a more rosy hue, as if shot through with an extra dose of blood from within. 

The beauty of these blooms, apart from the exquisite way they change color depending on the light and the time of day, is their perfume. Sweet and soft and the merest whisper of spring and summer – it is the breath of hope, expelled in the coldest of winter nights. 

I crashed early this year. Usually, I can make it to at least February before feeling the drudge of winter. This weekend, I felt it. Too soon. Too early. There is too much more to go. The only thing that saved me was a visit to the market, where I stumbled unexpectedly upon a few classic spring blooms. Leaning into the hyacinths and daffodils, I breathed in the sweet scent of spring, a couple of months early, and just int he nick of time. 

I was talking to Kira last time I was in Boston and proposing a possible visit to the New England Flower Show (if such a thing still happens). This is the sort of thing that gets us through the winter. 

Some see a flower, some see a crucifixion, I happen to see the wizened face of a lion.

This questionably-monikered Thanksgiving Cactus began blooming a couple of week ago, which is why I’m considering it more of a Halloween cactus at this point. Such a strong pink is more apropos for that holiday rather than the amber and autumnal hues of Turkey Day anyway.

As much as I abhor photoshopping pictures, on my Instagram I tend to add a little boost of saturation to some of my nature shots. What can I say? I love color, and sometimes the intensity is lost in the lighting or shaky camera work. For these photos, no such amendments were necessary, supporting proof of my theory that flowers in the fall glow more brilliantly than at any other time of the year.

This simple Pelargonium veritably thrills with its neon-like sparkle. It sat in a lowly pot with another annual that had long passed its prime, but this one kept going, shining brightly until the first hard frost will finally strike it down.

It is often said that there are no true-blue flowers in the natural world. I’d fallen for this notion over the years, perpetuating the idea and even making vague plans to seek out the closest we could get (the elusive Himalayan blue poppy), yet it appears there are such hues, as this salvia begs to differ. Check out the vibrant blue tones here, in unfiltered, un-additionally-saturated form. It’s nice when the universe defies humankind’s stories. It keeps me on my toes. {Insert ‘Black Swan’ reference here.}

The extended warmth of this fall season has produced a bountiful crop of dahlia blooms. I have a soft-spot in my heart for this flower, for myriad reasons. It was one of the first plants I ever planted and grew in the little side garden that my parents allotted for me. I watered and weeded and took care of them for the entire summer, wondering when they would deign to bloom. The payoff came later, but was worth it as shades of crimson and peach and lemon yellow exploded as the school year was about to begin. I wouldn’t grow them again for a long time; that was too long to wait for such color, and the idea of waiting until school began to enjoy a bloom sucked the fun out of it.

These days, I still find their blooming period a little too late. By this stage I’m ready to shift focus indoors. However, this year has kept us out later than normal, and it’s always nice to see how others have employed such a lovely garden plant.

Here, the late morning light softens the saturated glow of the dahlia’s fiery petals.

Sounding a clarion for beauty and perfume, the tropical angel’s trumpet plant (Brugmansia) was once a stalwart presence on our summer patio. After a few years, however, I got tired of lugging the large pots up and down the attic staircase, so they fell out of favor and have been missing for the last several seasons. This year, I found a large robust specimen at Faddegon’s for a relatively reasonable price (they’ve gotten way too expensive for such an easily-propagated species) and brought them back into our summer fold.

Luckily, they bloomed, which isn’t always the case with this plant. (It usually takes a year or two to get them going.) Their lemony fragrance is a delight, particularly as it ripens and becomes most pronounced as the evening progresses. It’s a magical thing when perched beside the pool on a hot summer night, emitting its lovely perfume and filling the area with sweetness. The pendulous dangling form of its flowers are just as enchanting as its scent, enthralling with their trumpet-like form, beckoning for a closer inspection like most objects of mystery and beauty do.

Their care is simple – lots of sun and heat, lots of water and regular fertilizing, and then over-wintering indoors if you’re in the brutal Northeast. I’m pretty sure they’re only hardy to about zone 8 or warmer, but I’ve heard tales of plants surviving in unheated garages. That’s too risky for a grand specimen like this, so I’ll bring it in to the basement for a change. I can usually get two or three years out of a plant this size without needed to repot – just a top dressing of new soil and some additional fertilizer throughout the year usually suffices. After three or four years, you’ll need to repot or start over again with cuttings. The latter is often easier.

This post is for my friend Diana, who once coaxed a moonflower to the brink of bloom last year only to have it wither on the vine a day or two before blossoming. That kind of heartache is a blow to even the most seasoned of gardeners, but I’m happy to see that this year she’s had several big blooms to make up for it.

I happened upon this particularly robust moonflower vine the last time I was in Boston. Paired with a traditional old-fashioned morning glory, it makes for a full day of flowers: there are early blue blooms at the break of day, and these wonderful white beacons in the afternoon and evening.

They have a very delicate fragrance that becomes slightly more pronounced in the evening, but this is one flower that doesn’t shout its presence out with vulgar lily-like bombast. It whispers. Evokes. Sighs.

This is how we say goodbye to summer.

It’s difficult to upstage two dozen roses, particularly when they’re in fiery shades of orange and salmon in the hues that Ina Garten so favors. The only way is to shock and awe your way into new realms of wonderful by complementing them with an equally-striking shade of chartreuse, as seen in the pair of sweet potato vines I added to this already-remarkable bouquet.

There’s something to be said for the simplicity of a single-flower-style arrangement, especially when the blooms are super-saturated in these rich pigments. I appreciate the elegance of the notion, the way form and architecture come to greater light through repetition and symmetry. Almost anything can be made more impressive when en masse. Sometimes, though, you need a little extra pizzazz. Something that adds a sparkle and pop, the glittering cherry on a sundae dripping with sweet goodness. That finds form in the humble sweet potato vine, which winds its way through those rosy environs to set off its lime-green leaves in striking contrast. The first hard frost will instantly fell such delicate foliage; this is one way of prolonging the beauty if the weather forecasters give warning.

We’ve had a darker start to summer than anyone would like, but there are ways to bring a sunny side to circumstances no matter how much rain, or lack of electricity, might work to dampen the day. Such was the state of affairs when JoAnn and some of the Cape Crew stopped by this weekend. It’s been too long since we hung out, and this is something for which we’ve all been waiting. Reunions with dear friends are somehow more wonderful in the summer, as if the universe is conspiring to create its own dose of happy kismet. We all seemed to need that.

There’s an awful lot of sadness and heartache in the world today – on a universal and personal level for some of us – and the only way to get through it is to surround yourself with friends and family and hold on until things get better. Parents have passed, relationships have ended, and everyone feels a little lost lately. Summer can only ease so much; one needs a good group of friends to make up for the rest.

They arrived to a batch of lavender martinis, and brought with them roses and crystal cuff links and Portuguese pastries. We hit it hard, but not too hard, starting early in the afternoon, and by the time dinner rolled around, we were feeling no pain. Good thing too, as the electricity went out just as the meal was served. The sun was starting to go down, so we brought in some extra candles and had an old-fashioned candle-light dinner. It added to the atmosphere and the intimacy, and maybe those little foibles are meant to be. Like clockwork, the electricity was back on by the time dessert (New York cheesecake!) was being plated. Afterward, we played a few rounds of Cards Against Humanity, then called it a relatively early night.

The next morning was greeted with brunch and then a full day of poolside revelry. The sun gods, so fickle and moody these past few weeks, smiled indulgently and granted us a perfect day. Our guests, friends old and new, eased into the weekend. The first night is always flush with excitement and catching-up; the second day is when you can ripen into relaxation. We sat by the pool letting the sun move slowly overhead, lazily draining the cooler of beer, and digging into the red pepper dip once brunch had settled.

As with most summer weekends, it went by too quickly, but we’ll have the memory of it when the days turn cold again.

Here we have the classic clematis, which in this case climbed so high I never did get a proper full-on view of the pretty flower. There’s something enchanting about viewing it all from below, however, as these shots will attest. It leaves a little more to the imagination, and we fill in the missing parts with tales and notions that might be far more interesting than what could ever really be there.

The idea of a flower being out of reach lends temptation and desire to an otherwise common clematis. Too often we want what is just beyond our grasp.

Here’s to straining to see it.

A yellow ceramic hurricane vase forms the perfect backdrop to this bold fuchsia bloom. The colors depend on one another for maximum pop, complementing and cajoling each to loftier heights of greater glory. It is my humble opinion that one can never have enough color. Our bleak world demands it.