Spring flowers invite us to get outdoors and enjoy the fresh air, the sunshine and participate in the renewal of life that spring signifies. While it's important to inspect your home for winter damage and tackle home maintenance chores, you also want to re-charge your emotional batteries. Flowers impact our moods in positive ways and they can improve the quality of our lives.
Rarely do we have enough time to stop and purchase fresh flowers on a regular basis, so planting perennials in your garden will help insure you enjoy flowers for many years. Think about the flowers you enjoyed as a child. Do you have special flowers you associate with positive experiences and/or people you love? Planting flowers that remind you of these special experiences will make your garden an integral part of your day-to-day life.
Flowers for Every Season
It's tempting to buy lots of annuals when you visit your local nursery and they last longer and they are beautiful. With a little more planning you can find different perennials that bloom in the spring, summer and fall. With perennials, once they're planted they will bloom for many years so they're really cost effective in terms of your time and money.
Picking the right flowers is important as you've got to consider the type of soil you have, sunlight and temperatures. Some plants are easier to grow and some are hardy once you've nurtured them through the first year or 2 like the hydrangeas I love. You have many choices in where and how you plant your flowers. Here are ideas to help you add a bit of color to your home this year, color you can enjoy outdoors and with careful planning you can arrange flower boxes so you can see them from inside too.
Flower Boxes
Flower boxes traditionally hang right below windows. Today's flower boxes can sit just below window sills or on the side or top of railings on a porch or deck. Flower boxes offer a great way for people outside and indoors to enjoy the amazing colors of your blooming flowers. If you love certain annuals, flower boxes are a great way to add their color and fragrance to your home's decor.
Trellis and Ornamental Home Features
You have many ways to decorate the sides of your home, from shutters to decorative window trim and trellis' are one of my favorites with the natural color they add to your home's facade. Trellises are made from metal, wood and vinyl. They offer many choices in shapes and designs with horizontal, vertical and even diagonal bars to create decorative structure including walls, a tower or archway.
While we tend to think of fencing as functional, they also provide a wonderful backdrop for large splashes of color. A fence provides a good alternative to the trellis when you’re not comfortable with vines near your house.
Other Great Ideas for Flowers
Where you place flowers is a matter of creativity. Each house and it's surrounding landscaping offers unique opportunities that no list can capture although we invite you to share your ideas and photos. Placing flowers in front of your home, i.e. surrounding your mailbox, will enhance your home's curb appeal. If you spend a lot of time in your backyard, why not can focus your flowering green thumb on color you can enjoy when outdoors.
When shoveled snow damaged the shrubs next to our deck, we replaced them with perennials – Stell De Oro daylilies and Siberian iris. I cut back the dry leaves and foliage in the fall so the growing pile of snow does no harm – no more broken branches. When spring arrives, the snow melts (good for the soil) and new leaves and blossoms grow.
Gayle, If you’re able to send me photos, I’d love to share them here. You make a good point that flowers may sometimes withstand weather better than shrubs.