Design Your Spaces

This old proverb is very telling; “He who fails to plan, plans to fail.” These words of wisdom stick around for a reason – to remind us that one small sentence can change your outlook. It’s time to apply this mantra and design your spaces. Mapping out your ideas is the backbone to successful gardening and all the nuances of landscape design.

What are the projects that you mulled around in the back of your mind this winter or even last year? For many, it is to expand or add a vegetable garden. For others, it may be to design a backyard fire pit, sitting wall or terrace that captures your favorite vista. When the long summer days roll around, you want to be enjoying your new space, not still be creating it.

Don’t miss out on these last few weeks of winter planning. Dig out those journals and ideas. Find your favorite photos you tore out of magazines and layout your plan on paper. If you can imagine it, you most likely can do it. Take some time this weekend to put your gardening caps on and plan, plan, plan. And when those lazy days of humidity and baking sunshine hit your town or city, you are ready to kick back in your new digs. Don’t leave your options to chance. Formulate, design and carry out your vision. The inspirational thought for the weekend is by Cora Lea Bell. “An addiction to gardening is not all bad when you consider all the other choices in life.” Have a great weekend. Annie. P.S. To my faithful blog reader, R.H., I promise Monday's brain teasers will be about something edible!

(Image from internet - telltale signs of garden addiction.)

Stems and Twigs – a Chic Bouquet

Oscar Wilde once said, “Conversation about the weather is the last refuge of the unimaginative.” No discussion about weather although we may not see sunshine until next Tuesday! So let’s get some yellow replicated in our kitchens with a simple remedy for this blah weather.

Annie’s quick tip to add some early spring color: create a chic bouquet with stems and twigs. A month or so in advance of when an early flowering shrub like Forsythia blooms, you can force its buds inside. Forsythia is easily found on many properties and is not difficult to force in a vase. Look for a stem with the most buds. Prune between 1 to 1 ½’ of the tail end of the branch and place in water. Some people add a little bit of sugar to condition the water and add nutrients. The buds start to wake up and eventually bloom for you inside.

Be creative with the shrubs and trees in your yard. As soon as the sap starts to flow, many plants are in the process of waking up. When you see the buds swelling on a shrub or tree’s branches, you could add more of these miscellaneous stems and twigs to your arrangement. This technique also works with flowering Dogwoods, Crabapples, Magnolias, and various early blooming Azaleas and Rhododendrons. Don’t forget to look for one of Annie’s childhood favorites, the wild Pussy Willows.

Be polite with your plants. No serious haircuts, just a trim to create a chic bouquet with stems and twigs. The inspirational thought of the day ends with another Oscar Wilde quote. “Be yourself; everyone else is already taken.” Great advice - it leaves lots of room for trial and error!

*(Top image of Forsythia and bottom image of Pussy Willow from internet)

The Hellebores are Coming

What a lucky Wednesday. For those of us located smack-dab in the pocket of just-right temperatures of heavy, wet snow, we may have to think winter for a few more days. Look on the bright side - this snow is good exercise for the gardener. Just one shovel full makes your face grimace with pain. It’s real heavy stuff!

So let’s think Hellebores. This special plant is often overlooked in the United States but one to be added to your list. This plant blooms early in the garden, sometimes forgotten as we get immersed in our early spring grunt work. Its special form and growing habits make it an ‘Annie’s’ favorite. The Perennial Plant Association has helped this wonderful plant grow in popularity when it honored Hellebores as the 2005 ‘Perennial Plant of the Year’. This type of award always catapults s a plant into the throes of a gardener’s heart but we loved it long before then. In England, you’ll often see hellebores blooming in the winter with Chinese Witchhazel, Mahonia, Jasmine and winter flowering Rhododendrons. In New England, we just have to wait a bit longer.

So in good British spirit, where we first fell in love with the likes of Hellebores, today’s inspirational quote is by David Bowie. He probably sums up today’s storm best. “Is it nice in your snowstorm- freezing your brain? Do you think that your face looks the same?” Who knows what he means? He certainly is great in concert. Have a great Wednesday. Annie

(Top Photo - Hellebores - Photo from the Internet)
(Bottom photo - Ben freezing his brain - Photo by Greg Bilowz)