Last week, while cleaning up around the garden, I (finally) cut down the dead flower-heads of some ornamental Alliums that had bloomed back in June.
You might remember this story back in the fall, where I talked about and posted pictures of us going to the garden centre for bulbs, and these were something new that I added to our garden. Well, they ended up growing quite tall and blooming beautifully, and I was happy to have added them. Since I’ve never tried them before, I’m not sure how well they’ll come back next year, but my fingers are crossed.
Anyway, after they had flowered and faded, I left them where they were for far too long, because I liked the way they looked when they were dead, all spiky and star-like. But the wind eventually knocked them over and they began to look not-so-good, so I clipped them and tossed them onto the compost heap. And as I went back and forth doing other jobs around the yard, I kept passing them, and feeling the urge to rescue them. So I went inside and got a vase. To them I added some bits I’d pruned from a rose bush gone rogue, and a few yarrow flowers that had broken and fallen over the walkway.
And presto, I had an interesting looking bouquet to decorate our outdoor space. I did this on the 2nd of July and here were are on the 16th, and this arrangement still looks pretty much the same. Well the Allium skeletons and the rose bush trimmings do, but the yarrow has dried up and could use replacing, but still, two weeks later and it still looks decent.
Now, I’m not expecting everyone to just happen to have some of these same plants at their disposal to create a bouquet of foraged flowers, but rather just suggesting that sometimes clippings from a garden that look like they’re destined for the compost heap can be saved and made into something pretty.
Thank you for taking a look,
xo loulou
