Wordless Wednesday: Charm City Tulips

Ode to Artificial Flowers

One of the reasons I’ve been so busy this month is that I’m working on a Baltimore themed luncheon with others. We decided that the centerpieces should be artificial flowers. I went to the dollar store and they came through for me because they had racks and racks of them on display. I got in line and it seemed that everyone was buying them. No one seemed to think it was unusual that I was buying 30 bunches. Ahhh…springtime in Baltimore!

As I work on this and neglect my real garden, people all around me are placing these very dollar store flowers and pots on their front porches or in the dirt of their front yard. Living rooms here all seem to be full of plastic flora. Like with fake Easter grass, I can’t say that I hate them, as they are just a part of life here. If it makes other people happy, fine. I’d rather have real flowers though, which is why I grow some specifically to cut every summer.

Over the weekend I finished the fake flower arrangements. Here they are growing all over the floor in the middle bedroom.

Mmmmmm...free samples!

On Thursday evening I got home to find a pair of large boxes waiting for me. Well, I didn't order anything and opened them with some curiosity. Inside were these two trays of plants from PanAmerican Seed. Left to right we have:

Marigold Bonanza Deep Orange
Begonia Dragon Wing
Begonia Gryphon
Petunia Shock Wave Coral Crush
Angelonia Serena Blue
Wave Purple Improved Spreading Petunia

When I got them it was too cold to put them in the ground and so I kept them on the back porch. In fact, it was so cool that I was concerned enough to put a sheet over them at night. But, the weather is now improving so once I get a chance to get a little garden clean-up going I'm going to stick them in the ground. Some will go out front and some will go in the back yard flower bed.

Love that Easter Grass!

Examiner.com is getting better with the ads and pop-ups so hopefully I can get back into promoting it a bit more. Though, April is going to be a busy month for me and I just put up "Growing natural grass in an Easter basket" as a placeholder. After that there are probably going to be a lot of events posts as so many local garden festivals happen in May.

Ah, as for Easter grass. I never grew winter rye specifically for an Easter basket but I do use it for my outdoor pots. I just scatter seeds over the tops of the soil in the pot and let it go. In spring I turn it out into the compost pile and let the grass rot. It doesn’t look very Eastery at that point but the grass did its job (soil conservation and enrichment so I can reuse the soil). I never had real grass in my basket when I was growing up but then I never felt deprived for not having it. I mean, if I had kids I’d grow a basket of live grass for a centerpiece or something but I’d just give them baskets full of the fun fake stuff. I can’t imagine any kid would enjoy loosing jellybeans down in the dirt.

While I’m busy, enjoy this seasonal photo from Maja of stock.xchng. (I promise I’ll get back to my own photos sometime soon!)