Welcome to ‘In A Vase On Monday’ when I am linking up with Cathy at Rambling In The Garden to share a vase of flowers picked from my garden every Monday.
Christmas has officially started in our house now – our American family are with us, I have been to see The Messiah at the Cathedral, The Snowman at the Peacock Theatre in London and hosted afternoon tea for a large family gathering. The tree is up, the wood burner is on and I am preparing to start wrapping presents this week. Today I wanted to make a few seasonal posies from the garden to add to the festive decorations.
This time last year I had Christmas roses (helleborus niger) in flower, but I am still waiting for these lovely white flowers, which you can see in my new seasonal header taken from a photo from year, to arrive. There are plenty of buds but no flowers – perhaps the warm late autumn has confused them. Fortunately I have a white spray chrysanthemum still flowering in the greenhouse, which filled the gap beautifully.
I have used three small vintage style antiqued silver vases, with matching tea lights and my favourite Christmas birds as a windowsill display.
I need to check the name of this chrysanthemum for you (as I write it is too dark to venture out to the greenhouse), as it is certainly one I would recommend for late flowering – it only came into flower at the start of December.
Having grown greenhouse chrysanthemums for the second year now I am ready to refine my ordering for next season. I loved the burnt oranges and deep pinks in the autumn (around October time), but as December approached I started to crave more white flowers to go with the winter palette of greens.
Next year I am going to order only white varieties for the late chrysanthemums that flower in mid November and December and keep the autumnal colours to mid flowering varieties, so that I can have these colours a little earlier in October. This year I ordered all late flowering varieties of which only two were white.
Readers who have been with me since last year will know how much I love to use twigs in my winter arrangements. Today I have used twigs cut from a philadelphus bush, which still have their seed heads attached.
I also have my first viburnum tinus berries – I planted a couple of bushes of viburnum tinus ‘Eve Price’ a few years ago and this is the first time the beautiful berries that I have admired in florists shops have appeared in my garden.
The small pink and white flowers and green leaves are from viburnum tinus ‘Gwenillian’ and ‘French White’
I hope you have enjoyed this weeks ‘In A Vase On Monday’ and I apologise for failing to produce anything last week – I was full of good intentions but the days just slipped through my fingers. Next week is the week of Christmas and we have a pantomime booked, carol services to attend and a rather large turkey to eat. Then it is on to hastily packing our bags for our annual post Christmas trip to the Alps – where there is rather worryingly little snow at the moment. I am keeping my fingers crossed for a cold snap as I do love to be there when it is snowing.
Time permitting I will be back with another festive vase from the garden next Monday. In the meantime I hope you will pop over to Cathy’s blog to see what she and the others have made this week.
Insert your profile info here, by going to Users -> Your Profile -> Biographical Info. Profile image (avatar) comes from gravatar.com. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Nullam faucibus ornare lectus nec cursus.
Awesome. I am certainly going to copy your idea for the small antique glass containers as a table decoration-really charming.
Having the chrysanthemums is such an asset – and such a good contrast with the viburnum berries and flowers. Just noticed those philadelphus twigs too. Interesting to read about your proposed restriction of late chrysanths to white only – this meme really concentrates the mind doesn’t it? Thanks so much for your contribution too – you always inspire us with your vases 🙂 I thought I was always busy, but my busy-ness is very different from yours – wouldn’t want the thought of having to pack for going away on top of everything else!
I like everything about these vases Julie. I think i need more white flowers in every season but i do know exactly what you mean about white flowers with evergreen foliage, as in my vase last week.
I love these vases.
And I completely agree with you about the white. I find it difficult to mix white with other colours in the summer, but it’s just perfect in the winter, when the colours are all more subdued and you’re often pairing white with green.
Just beautiful, thanks for sharing!
Lovely! I think white is just as festive as red and looks so fresh and cheerful. Our long-term forecast just showed a slight dip in temperatures after Christmas, so I do hope you get some snow in the Alps!
Julie what a fabulous holiday you have planned. And these little vases are amazing. Wishing you snow.
Lovely vases and very festive. . I think it is a great idea to grow white Chrysanthemums in the greenhouse for winter arrangements. I think I will do the same next year if you can remember the name.
Have a lovely Xmas Julie.
Gorgeous! I’m very envious of your spray chrysanths. I adore the berries of Viburnum tinus. I have ‘Gwenllian’ and use it a lot at this time of year. In fact the berries are in my wreath. Sounds like a busy festive period coming up. Fingers crossed for the snow. 🙂
Beautiful arrangements, Julie. I love the white chrysanthemums and the silvery containers…
Happy Holidays!
Lisa
Your vintage silver arrangements are so pretty and festive Julie.