What better to think about and plan while the weather remains wet and stormy, and yet we feel that the new gardening year will soon enough be upon us. Flowers, wild and cultivated, beautiful and colourful, reminding us of summer, of sunshine and warmth.
Looking back at many of the flowers we had in the garden last year, I know that some of them I will certainly repeat this time around. The sweetpeas gave us such pleasure, we picked bunch after bunch, the scent was heavenly and made for a very cheerful breakfast table, so that is a definite Yes. The coriander and oregano are also a definite Yes! These are herbs my kitchen simply cannot do without, and the flowers, though small are pretty, when plentiful they can be used as part of a herbal flower decoration. The nasturtiums are always there also, I sow them yearly, they are pretty for their flowers but I also use both leaf and flower in salads, or I might eat some of the leaves while walking in the garden. As for the hydrangea, I have four different bushes growing, a deep lapis lazuli blue one, a pretty pink one, and two pure white ones. Some years ago I tried to change the colour of one of my white hydrangeas with a product I bought in the garden centre, but I did not succeed, and it did not matter, I will try again some time. The Ph of the soil here in my raised beds is 7, so total balance between alkaline and acid, and the colour depends on the Ph of the soil.
Marigolds grew profusely in the garden last summer, they just kept on flowering, I like the orange types, they are definitely on the list for this season also. The poppies are self seeding, they are beautiful and great for the bees and other flying creatures, but they do have a habit of coming up among the vegetables and become too large sometimes. The fuchsia flowers are seen all over West Cork, in a good year some of the hedgerows are coloured red with them, lovely. They flower from May onwards, and might still be in flower in November. I have them only at the back of the garden, in the hedge.
The big bright yellow flower was going to be a lovely round pumpkin, only last summer all my pumpkins rotted, so while the promise was there in the flower, it did not come to fruition. The blackberry flowers are frilly and white, they also just form part of the hedge and I let them grow mainly for the bees and butterflies. It is great to see all the insects and butterflies come and feed in the garden.
Finally after about three years my wall flowers have started to produce lots of dark rose velvety flowers, nice, and they give off a faint scent, it brings me memories of gardens and flowers in another period of my life, precious memories of flowers.
agoyvaerts 
We’re lucky to be able to grow flowers all year round but it must be nice to have a winter rest and dream about spring 🙂
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Yes I think so too, it is the absence of flowers in the winter that makes spring time so exciting and lovely, and summer altogether beautiful with the abundance. 🙂
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I saw cowslips starting to flower in my garden today. Too early but much appreciated.
Lovely post anyway, Agnes.
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Early, yes, it’s been so mild this winter, now getting colder here finally.
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Same here. Hopefully not too cold, though.
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I think, the cold off-season makes us appreciate the growing times more.
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Very true, it really does help.
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such a wonderful gallery of colorful and beautiful flowers. I love sweetpeas from my childhood and planted them some years ago, but the snails were eating them up, unfortunately. I hope you are fine, Agnes. We had snow last night, now it rains and is windy. I’m looking forward to spring, you too? Kind regards from Hamburg, Mitza
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Hi Mitza, all things well enough here, thank you.
Slowly my mind is coming around now to planning the vegetables and flowers I will grow this year. The weather is still not very encouraging though so I have to be patient 🙂
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that’s true, Agnes. Just imagine, the weather was so bad today that I could only do a little walk with my bike. It was too slippery from the snow. I could live without winter 🙂
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But all the same here we would love some snow, just to see the landscape covered in beautiful pure white, I dream of it 🙂
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Then maybe go to Sweden. There you can find a lot of snow and wonderful, beautiful landscapes, forests, lakes, moose etc.
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The temptation is there all right, but so far I have not seriously considered Sweden as a travel destination.
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We have been in Sweden several times and I can tell you, it’s a very beautiful country in the summer and in wintertime. We drove up the E4 passing forests with lakes and little Swedish villages with these snugly houses in red and white. People are very friendly, but a bit slow. Tell them a joke, and they laugh next week, hehe
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One for the list so, and whatever about the people, fast or slow, no problem 🙂
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I love Sweden, too. Have been there many times as I have a friend who lives in the Stockholm area. Watch out for the mosquitoes in summer, though 😉
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Yes mosquitoes, haha…they love me.
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that’s nice to hear.We had friends at the Vättern lake. I always loved to go there in winter and summer and cannot remember too many mosquitos but lots of blueberries and wonderful chanterelles etc. in the forests and very tasty trouts in the lakes. Very friendly people which I would like to see again. Thanks for writing, have a nice week-end, regards Mitza
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Enjoy your weekend too Mitza.
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Lovely memories and hopefully a glimpse of what lies before us this summer. Happy gardening:)
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And you too, looking forward to our summer!
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Wonderful galery of flowers
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Thanking you.
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Oh! Thank you for this blast of colour.
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Whilst looking round a garden centre the other day, I noticed that nasturtium come in several varieties. I was astonished…. But mine have successfully self-seeded so I couldn’t justify buying any more.
I love pumpkin flowers – a pity they are hidden so often and only last a short while. I hope your pumpkins fare better this year. Why did they rot?
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Not sure why they rotted Helen, it started with the flower with some, some others grew to the size of a tennis ball and then started to rot. I will try again this coming season. My nasturtiums also self seed, and I took some seeds which I will sow in spring, love the cheerful colours of this flower 🙂
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Most of my pumpkins rotted at about the size of a golf ball, which I thought was because they weren’t fertilised. At the size of a tennis ball, that seems less likely.
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I guess that they rotted because of the very wet summer around here, and I left too many leaves around the growing pumpkin, so I know better for next time.
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Yes, learn by observation as I was reminded today on the first day of my Permaculture Design course 🙂
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How lovely Helen, you have started a Permaculture Design Course! Observation is indeed the best tip ever, I did a few classes too and it gave this advice: Be with your garden, sit with your garden, watch it and spend time in it just observing, it helps you see what needs doing and how things want to grow. One of the observations I’ve made over the years is that my wild plants (weeds) most of which are edible, will grow so easily and profusely, without me interfering, and so I let them, and use them in my cooking 🙂
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