From out to in

Ok, so one of my major life goals for the past few years has been to create a cutting garden at home, big enough so I can regularly cut flowers from my yard for vases indoors, but still have enough flowers left outside to enjoy outdoors.  It will definitely take some time to establish this, but I'm working on it.

It's so nice to be able to cut something beautiful from your own yard, instead of having to buy it at the store.  (The floral shops are for the winter months.)

I've been trying to plant more perennials each year.  Here are a few things that have bloomed for me lately:

I think lily trees are my new favorite plant.

I planted this lily tree maybe three years ago...it's now taller than my 6' fence!

It has about fifteen flower buds this year.

Here's one of the lilies in a vintage green vase I found.

The flowers are huge!

Just one looks lovely by itself.

And they smell wonderful!

I asked my husband not to buy me flowers for our anniversary this year, because we were going out of town three days later, and I couldn't bring myself to have to throw them away.

So he brought me a single red rose, just so I'd "have something."

I went out in the yard to see if I could find something to add to it; I used one purple gladiolus and cut one stem of purple balloon flowers.

But don't they look so beautiful all together?

Just three flower stems, but wow!

Another beautiful vintage vase from an antique shop.

I love this one because the back of it is tall (it's hard to tell behind the flowers), so it helps support tall flowers that might want to flop over, like the gladiolus.

Here is a jar of white hydrangeas, by night (all lit up) and by day.

This shrub came with the house I bought, and I never thought to cut any flowers till last year.

They look so simple and beautiful...I couldn't wait to cut more this summer.

This blue and white combination is perfect!

The glass jar is from an antique shop, of course.

The shrub is actually on a rental property; I was able to dig up an offshoot with some roots.

I'm going to see if I can get the baby to grow at my own house.

There is a heat wave/drought in Tennessee right now; I'm afraid I'm going to lose a few of my plants.  Perhaps the most frustrating aspect of gardening is suddenly losing a plant you've nurtured forever due to weather (or disease, or some other unknown problem). 

It's another reason I try to divide my plants and plant them wherever I happen to be...gardening can get expensive, but dividing and sharing help.  

I just found a big perennial sale yesterday, so I added a couple new plants to the collection.  Pictures to come, of course!