Welcome to ‘In A Vase On Monday’ when I am linking up with Cathy at Rambling In The Garden to join her challenge to fill a vase for the house from the garden every week.
This week I have my first summer posy to share with you. The roses and perennials are just starting to show their faces and I have managed to find enough to fill a small jam jar. The vegetable garden is also starting to look more productive and the chickens are laying well, so in the spirit of the abundant garden to which I aspire I have added todays pickings to my photos as props!
Along with my flowers today I was able to find a handful of strawberries, a few pods of broad beans, plenty of asparagus and 3 eggs.
The rose I have used is climbing rose Crown Princess Margareta, a David Austin rose. She is a beautiful apricot orange shade with a strong fruity scent. I have planted it in both the climbing and bush form in the garden and it is performing very well for a young rose (planted in the early spring last year).
This has been the best year yet for my asparagus. The season started early, before the end of April, and I have barely been able to keep up with the rate of growth of the spears. We can carry on harvesting until mid June and then the beds will be left to form ferns, which will be cut back in November. I know that asparagus purists will be horrified, but throughout the summer months I plan to grow my sunflowers between the asparagus plants. Being tall they will flower above the height of the ferns and hopefully the ferns will act as a support to the long sunflower stems. I also have self seeded foxgloves growing amongst the asparagus – as long as they are not growing to close to the asparagus it seems to grow without any problem. Being such a flower lover I hate to waste any growing space, so I am always looking for ways to inter crop my flowers and vegetables.
I was delighted to see the first scabious flowers today. The large flower is scabiosa caucasia perfecta and the smaller ones are scabiosa ‘Butterfly Blue’. Both are a lovely shade of lavender blue.
I cannot remember harvesting strawberries in May before. I know these are an early variety, but mid June is when I would expect them. I need to take the net off the tunnel and pack some straw under the plants quickly as the strawberries are ripening on the soil. It is best not to wash strawberries so the straw helps to keep them clean.
I have added a couple of clematis blooms and some stems of catmint and salvia to the posy to increase the blue and mauve shades – very much in the spirit of Chelsea this year!
I have some large plants of catmint (this one is nepeta ‘Blue Cloud’) growing in my borders – it is a magnet for the bees and butterflies. I really liked the way a number of the Chelsea designers had literally dotted it through their borders this year, so in the autumn I intend to lift the large clumps and divide them into very small plants. I can then dot them through my borders for a similar effect. A word of warning though – catmint can be quite a thug, so be prepared to lift and split plants regularly if you plan to add them to your borders in this way.
Nowadays I always harvest the broad beans whilst they are still small. In my early days of vegetable growing I would leave the crops far too long before harvesting and often ended up with tasteless woody produce as a result. Now everything is picked at the earliest opportunity and I enjoy my produce far more as a result.
I hope you have enjoyed todays medley of garden produce and that you will pop over to Cathy’s blog to see what she and the others have found from their gardens to put in a vase this week.
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Your excellent photographs capture this enchanting arrangement perfectly Julie. Smart to include vegetables and flowers for an interesting story and the combination of apricot against the blue-lavender flowers so appealing.
This is such a lovely post. Not only the flower posy, but also the produce from the garden creates a real early summer feeling. Love the apricot rose – and your photos are wonderful!
I love your collection. Pretty as a (the) picture. Sounds like you are making good use of every inch of space in your garden.
Enchanting arrangement, Julie and a lovely idea to include your harvest too. I was expecting peonies so you surprised me; I think I’d describe the colour scheme as opulent.
How lovely to combine your produce with your flowers. I love the apricot rose and it goes so well with the lavender Scabious. A really summery arrangement.
How lovely Julie – and great to have your own produce too (our chickens are not laying 🙁 ). The colour of your rose is amazing, and the scent sounds lovely – shame we can’t smell our blogs!! The scabious and clematis, although a contrasting colour and brilliant to accompany it and I am interested to read what you say about the nepeta. Is it always invasive, or just certain varieties? It is intriguing to see how our vases change as the year goes on, isn’t it? Thanks for joining in 🙂
What a lovely collection to honor the start of summer, Julie! I love the combination of the blue and peach colors in the vase. I’ve put sunflower seeds in among my corn, which is probably a no-no too but, like you, I’d like to get to most of the space I have.
Now that’s an eye – catching vase Julie and a most attractive colour combination. Oh your strawberries are well ahead of mine but then you are further south. Mine are just beginning to blush. I hope that they tasted as good as they look. I strawed mine on Monday so now it’s a waiting game 🙂
Lovely arrangement, and a very tasty little harvest too. That rose is a lovely colour, and I am envious that you have scabious open already, mine are a long way behind. Nepeta is a wonderful plant, I just wish my front garden wasn’t the central meeting place for the neighbourhood cats, I am sure they would just sit in any clumps I dared to plant, though I am going to try it in the back garden, which isn’t as popular for some reason.
Such a gorgeous posy! It really celebrates the essence of a garden bouquet. Full of character and the colours are just lovely. I adore scabious. I grow the starball variety for it’s intricate seedhead. Funny how you’re getting your first strawberries very early and I am picking my last strawberries very late (it’s winter this weekend!!)
Oh what a beautiful arrangement with vibrant colors and mixed textures. How I wish I had my very own garden now… Another dream to add to the inspiring list 🙂 Happy Monday to you!
Your flowers and vegetables are flawless, Julie. What a colour and texture. I want to know ,when the roses make their first blooms should to cut them in the bud stage in the first year. And not allow a single bloom to appear the first year.and when should you first ground a rose.