Every Monday Cathy at Rambling in the Garden invites fellow bloggers to join her by sharing a vase of flowers etc from our gardens. So here I am again, wondering what happened to last week. Time flies at this time of year!
I reused a few things from last week’s vase… the Allium was still looking lovely, the chives and a spiky Heuchera flower too. But the rest is new and a bit un-thought-out. But I like it!
The lupin in the middle is one of the many I now have that set themselves from a single plant added two years ago. Blue lupins grow at the roadsides here, usually accompanied by masses of yellow broom. Sadly a lot of the broom died in 2020 – the third drought year in a row. But there is hope as there are many smaller plants doing well. The lupins, however, seem completely unaffected by drought!
The Siberian Iris was so welcome… this is the first time it has flowered for me after being planted in the then new Butterfly Bed in October 2018.
A sprig of silvery Artemisia found its way into the vase too. I am constantly pulling this out! More Alchemilla, some Salvia and some Borage were also added.
Oh yes, and a white Polygonum flower was plonked in there too. A bit of a mishmash. But a pleasing one!
Do have a look at Cathy’s post and the other vases linked in to it.
And have a lovely week!
😎☀️🐝
Words and Herbs 
I am loving that lupin as it is so big and full. I’m always attracted to plant that doesn’t grow well here.
A lovely garden sampler, Cathy! Lupines are beautiful and tough plants, they seem to thrive in sandy meadows here. Seeing a whole field of them is a delight.
Lupins!!! It’s a great assemblage of blues and silvers. Plonking is what I normally do!!
Sorry for the Tuesday reply, Cathy – now that Tai Chi has started up again on Monday evenings I don’t get to respond to later vases till the morning, as I avoid screen time in the later evening! You have plonked a very pleasing mish mash in your vase, very much a ‘garden sampler’ as Eliza suggests. It is always interesting to compare what has started flowering in different places and there are no salvias, borage or Polygonum flowering here yet. The artemisia foliage, thug though it is, is great for adding a silvery foil to the contents of a vase
Love the Lupine, though it does remind me of the Monty Python “Dennis Moore” sketch.
Haha! Yes, that’s a good one!
A very sophisticated arrangement, Cathy, love it 😊. I actually think broom is rather short-lived and does support drought rather well. Hope you‘re both well and the weather is kind to you and the garden. Very wet and coolish here in Switzerland 🙈
Hi Annette. You are right… the broom along the main road here is regenerating and the scorched dead bits will hopefully eventually disintegrate. I intend to plant more in the garden as it will work as a windbreak. It has been sunny (and hot) and I am finally getting on top of the garden now. Hope you have had a nice time in Switzerland. 😃🤗
Oh that is a most fine vase Cathy made up of some of my favourite colours. The lupin is a most vibrant blue. I wish that I could grow them!
The lupins seem to like our soil and I have lots of seedlings now. 😃 It is wonderful seeing them growing wild too.
The colors are wonderful, I love the blues and that lupin! We have a native lupine here I long for..but, they are hard to grow and must seed in place.. someday. Hope it rains!
I never had luck with lupins in my old garden… the snails devoured any seedlings or young plants immediately! So I am very happy they like this garden. We only have a few slugs here… and plenty of birds and toads to eat them!
A stunning arrangement of blues and purple, Cathy. I love the variety you’ve chosen. It bothers me greatly to here about three years of drought. I’m so familiar with the pattern her in California, and it greatly disturbs me for all it portends. And for those of us who tend to our gardens with such affection, prolonged drought raises questions about the future, doesn’t it?
We have maps online where the extent of drought is visible and our region has gone down from dark red last summer (the worst level) to white (non-existent)! Our trees and shrubs look so much greener and are coping better with pests this year. And it has been a joy planting in the garden beds with DAMP soil right up to the surface! 😃
That’s wonderful news, Cathy. I am so glad you’re no longer plagued by drought conditions. It’s really worrisome!
Oh, very pretty! I used to grow lupines; maybe I should try again. 🙂
Oh yes, the lupins are so lovely and the seedlings are producing different colours now too. 😃
Wild lupines are excellent too, even if they do not behave so well in the garden. Sky lupin is not flashy, but punctuates meadows of California poppy. The two grew together is many places back before they got crowded out. Arroyo lupin is about a common now. It is sometimes added to wildflower mixes. I would like to grow the Texas bluebonnet because people who know it really like it.
The bluebonnets are really pretty. I find I look to the wild flowers for hints on what likes our soil and local climate and currently it is salvia and lupins at the roadsides. 😃
Some of the lupins as well as a few of the salvias are so specialized that they are not as happy in ‘good’ garden soil as they are in ‘relatively bad’ soil that they are endemic to. The species that I happen to like do well in gardens. Some that live in desert regions, for example, are unhappy in refined and regularly irrigated gardens.
Blue lupins growing at the roadsides, that must be a lovely sight. We’ve never been there at that time of the year. Plonked in and a mishmash but still so pretty. 😊
The wild flowers are wonderful in spring and summer. 😃
I must say that you “plonk” flowers in a vase beautifully, Cathy. 🙂
😉 Thanks Joanne!