Saturday, July 10, 2010

Dreaming of a Cutting Garden

I rarely cut flowers from my garden to bring them inside (except for peonies... I always have lots of them in the spring).  I know I should enjoy the flowers both inside and out, but honestly my garden has not been that great of a cutting garden since we bought this house almost 5 years ago.  The first few years of gardening I was figuring out what types of flowers I wanted and dealing with a mess that the previous homeowner left me.  This year I actually have some good blooms (although threatened by fungus) so I figured it was time to create a small bouquet. 



In this vase are cone flowers, gerber daisies, and liatris from my garden.  I purchased the green mums from the grocery store as a filler (they were only $3), but I could have gathered up more home grown blooms and eliminated the mums.  The vase is a vintage ironstone that was sitting in my basement and the table cloth is also vintage from the 1950s.  This has brightened up our little dinning room and even Andy noticed it. 



Next summer I'm definitely dedicating a raised bed completely to a cutting garden.  I'm thinking it will contain  cosmos (which I already have along my front walkway), dahlias (I've only got a few now so would need more),  zinnias (I have them now in containers only), and gerber daisies.  I'd also like to add a few more cone flowers to my front perennial bed.


Do you have a cutting garden?  If so, what do you grow in it?  I'd love to hear your ideas!

3 comments:

tina said...

Hi Jackie, Your liatris is like wow! I can never get liatris to grow like this but it does grow. Your bouquet is most sweet. No dedicated cutting garden here. I just cut from all the gardens. I wish I had the sun and space to have one though. I can't help but notice how green your grass is too. Ours is going dormant, dry and brown. The summer drought and heat have kicked in. You enjoy the weekend and get started on that cutting garden:)

Ellie Mae's Cottage said...

Thanks Tina! The liatris was here when we bought the house and does great (one of the few things that does really well). The grass I can't take any credit with.... that's Andy's baby and he's proud of it. He's got a sprinkler system on (we have well water so there aren't any water restrictions) so it stays nice and green.

Tracy said...

Hi Jackie - Beautiful bouquet! I rarely cut flowers from my gardens - I'm still at the newbie gardener phase where I want to leave every possible bloom in the garden. (Is that normal? :-) Probably not.) My bouquets only happen if flowers get bent or broken by the rain/wind. I didn't stake my delphs last year and had the most gorgeous delph bouquet ever. I would love a cutting garden - great idea. Hmm, that just might be next year's project.