With all the flowers, shrubs and trees I grow, it is a natural feeling to want to bring them indoors  for an up close and personal encounter. I try to have things out in the garden I can cut year round, even if in the dead of winter it is just interesting evergreen foliage and brightly colored branches. But come April, the long procession of flowers begins, and going out to stroll around and pick interesting subjects to arrange becomes a wonderful aside to my hobbies  of gardening and collecting junk.

For years a few friends of mine and I have been yard saling- thrift shop -free side of the road stuff junkies. We all have our own likes and styles, and generally don’t argue over finds, although a few times I have felt quite envious of their scores. Mostly what I pick up ends up working in the garden, decorating the garden, or holding flowers from the garden. One of our most oft-repeated lines as we scout junk is “well, you can aways use it as a planter!” ….and I do…..lots!  I have a growing collection of flower frogs I use to hold the stems in my containers

( BTW:did you know how toxic floral foam is? It contains two known carcinogens , formaldehyde and black carbon, and is not biodegradable which seems to fly in the face of those of us who are so careful to be good stewards of the ground we grow on) , and a vast collection of vases , pitchers,and  containers of all shapes and sizes that has oozed into every storage area in not only my house but the garage and the shed as well. They are placed decoratively on open shelves in the dining room, and out of sight in the hutch as well. They claim space on the storage shelves over the washer/dryer, have their own little red shelf in the mud room, line the wire shelves in the garage, and take up lots of space in the new shed. Some of the larger ones hide out in the cellar utility room .

 

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In late winter and spring, I use a lot of woody material in arrangements. Colored dogwood twigs, curly willow, crab apple and apple branches, flowering cherries, and plum trees, spirea, nine bark, lilacs, and viburnum all make it in to many vases. When I am cutting woody stems for arrangements I always use this trick….. take a vegetable peeler and peel off the bottom  few inches of bark from the stem the branch will take up water much better and have a MUCH longer life expectancy in the vase.

This cool sideways vase my mother gave me holds just two varieties of crabapple blossoms and stems on honeysuckle ( a variegated cultivar called Harlequin)..cool huh?

I have really expanded my stash of teeny tiny vases , for so many wonderful spring bloomers are petite and not only beautiful, but fragrant, which we so often miss because they grow so low to the ground.Old bottles are perfect for this, as are cruets, tea cups and small pitchers. Here they hold a single viburnum twig that has a heavenly fragrance, squill (scilla siberica) and pansies with euphorbias..

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.This last one I made to bring as a hostess gift .The green pail was 99 cents at Goodwill Store and holds emerging spirea foliage, ninebark branches, fothergilla (the little bottle brushes), tulips, and crab apple blossoms.  🙂 When you head out in your garden, bring a bucket and your clippers, and bring some happiness inside!