Tag: growing flowers

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Growing Flowers

The growing season is here again and my window sills are filling up with trays of germinating seeds. This year I’m growing a few different things; like Helichrysum subulifolium which are bright sunshiny-yellow papery flowers  which will look so jolly in yellow inspired bouquets.

I try to grow a wide selection of flowers and grasses as I think its important to have a good amount of texture and movement in a bouquet, posy, wreath or wall hanging – getting the right mix is so important!

So when I start looking at my seed catalogues its very easy to get a little carried away!

I also grow and dry Dahlias…but that’s another post!!

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Drying Flowers

As August approaches, the garden is in full bloom, and I’m picking flowers every day to dry. The Paper Daisies are starting to wind down, with their blossoms much smaller now compared to when they first bloomed in June. Soon, I’ll be pulling out the last of them.

The Strawflowers are the main star of my wreaths, and they’ve just begun to produce beautiful, large blooms on long stems. I prefer to wire most of my Strawflowers, as they work so well in wreaths that way. This year, I’ve grown a wider variety of colors, and my absolute favorite so far is the ‘Salmon Rose.’ It’s a warm, inviting hue that will look stunning in both bouquets and autumn wreaths.

My drying wall is currently overflowing with flowers, and there are many more to come. That means plenty more wreaths and bouquets are on the horizon!

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Growing Annuals

It’s April and I’ve planted out all my Autumn sowed hardy annuals, which included Larkspur. Last year Larkspur certainly got the better of me! I’d tried to grow it before in the past with no success and since starting my small dried flower business I felt Larkspur was a flower I needed for bouquets.

So I stored my seeds in the fridge for a few weeks, this is called Stratification, which I hadn’t done in the past and it turned out that it was quite important! I sowed my seeds in March and waited…and waited. Nothing apart from the odd one. So back to square one and started again, still very poor germination. I really didn’t know what I was doing wrong. Consequently I didn’t have many Larkspur blooms, although the few I did get were beautiful.

I figured out from various reads and advice that the best way was to sow them in the Autumn and over winter them in the greenhouse. Which is exactly what I did. I had fantastic germination and who would have thought that these little seedling could survive -8C temperatures? but they did. Apparently Larkspur quite like a cold spell, and they certainly got that.

They are all planted out in the beds now and will soon be flowering, and finally ill have beautiful Larkspur for my dried flower bouquets.