Time to Visit American Plant

As a child I would get the Christmas tree with my dad around this time of year. As I got older and lived away from home I always liked to get the Christmas decorations up the day after Thanksgiving. In the Midwest there were window boxes, vases in front of fireplaces, mantles, windowsills and so many other places to decorate. When I didn’t have enough garlands and greens I could easily cut branches off the trees and bushes in the backyard. When we moved to Capitol Hill we no longer had space for most of this stuff, but I would still decorate with live branches and fill the wall vase with greens. Now we live in northern Virginia and the space is still small. For whatever reason this year I didn’t feel like doing much of anything. But yesterday we finally went to American Plant to pick up some branches. I knew I would at least like to replace the bamboo branches in the dining room with something a bit more festive. We ended up getting two bunches - some taller so as to feign a tree of sorts. I haven’t had time to set things up yet this week so I have the branches sitting in water. I’ll need to dig out the one large box of Christmas decor and put up a few icicles and my favorite ornaments. The window baskets on the balcony will be ignored this year. It’s nice to have some reminders of the season. Each year feels a little different. 

Balcony Flowers from American Plant

It’s that time of year again. It’s time to fill the balcony window baskets with annual flowers. We have three baskets that are hung from the backs of the chairs that face outward toward the street. They are coco lined and have stayed in fairly good shape for three years. So twice a year we add pansies and violas for winter/Christmas and then again in spring with whatever annual flowers we like. Our last year spikes did not survive the harsh winter so we were in need of finding replacements. The pansies and violas actually did quite well surprisingly, but we needed a few more plants to fill in the blank spaces. So we went to American Plant to see what we could find. The salvia, angelonia and silver dollar were good spike replacements. The bracteantha, gerbera, and dahlia were the flower replacements. Our balcony “garden” is nothing like the many containers, window boxes, and gardens in the Midwest. And even our tiny patio garden on Capitol Hill had a birdbath and significant flowers and bulbs. But my husband likes having a little bit of things and he is the one who keeps the garden watered and cared for. He has a miniature rose that he has nurtured for almost three years. It comes back a few times during the year and is still going. So I got out my gardening gloves and a spoon and scooped out enough dirt so the new flowers could be added after figuring out which space suited each plant the best. It’s not easy to work on a small balcony making sure the dirt doesn’t fly off somewhere and keeping things tidy. But when it’s done it’s always lovely to observe the flowers - especially whenever we sit there and have a chat. It’s hard to believe it’s already spring/summer. The rituals never change. 

American Plant Spring Flowers

We always had gardens - in the Midwest and more recently on our tiny patio garden on Capitol Hill. It’s been four years since we moved to northern Virginia and we now have an even smaller balcony garden. By that I mean three coco lined window baskets that are suspended from the backs of the chairs. We filled the baskets with pansies, violas, and ivy for the winter/Christmas season and they all miraculously survived the rather harsh winter. But the boxes were a bit sparse since the spikes didn’t last. So after our morning walk we went to American Plant yesterday to see what we could find. We were looking for something that could replace the spikes, but also add a bit more color to the yellow, white, and maroon pansies. It’s always fun to look around the vast array of options. I didn’t think we would have room for anything more than six plants so we needed to choose carefully. I asked one of the gardeners what might be a good spike replacement and she offered the silver dollar as an idea. We didn’t want anything that would grow too wide or too tall and that seemed to be good. I had also googled some ideas and Angelonia came up. We found them and it looked nice too. Salvia is another flower that grows tall and thin so we got one of those. Since the balcony gets full sun we added in a yellow bracteantha, red Gebera daisy, and a pink spotted dahlia. The place was quite busy on a late Monday morning flower shopping spree. We used to have to wait until after Memorial Day to plant anything in the Midwest. It’s so nice to start the planting season sooner. 

American Plant Christmas Greens

We waited long enough. I usually like to do Christmas decorations the day after Thanksgiving. But since we weren’t home it dragged out until yesterday. We no longer put up a tree, but I do like to dress up the outside balcony baskets and also add some greens inside. So after our morning walk in the park we drove over to American Plant in Bethesda. When we lived on Capitol Hill we went there because they have such a great selection of Christmas cheer. But first we had to walk by the trees - they were the perfect size. The wooden Santa’s were really cute and the huge red bows were simply lovely. We passed by the mistletoe and the red berry branches. The hand made decorations were all so beautiful! I don’t know all of the names for the different greens but we always pick out a variety of branch types - especially the ones with blue berries. They always look so nice in the huge vase we keep in the dining room. Add a bit of red berries, pine cones, and a little bird and it looks so seasonal. We also found a really cool flower - protea pink mink. Tucking it in with the greens adds a bit of additional whimsy. I like to mix up the fake berries and pine cones with the real stuff. What I miss most is the smell of the evergreens that you don’t get with just the branches. So we got just enough stuff to look like Christmas in our house. It’s a nice time of the year. 

American Plant Pansies and Violas

It’s that time of year - again. I haven’t really felt like getting the flowers for fall/winter for our tiny balcony garden. It’s been cloudy and rainy all week and just doesn’t put me in the planting spirit. And a couple of the summer annuals are still blooming. We only have three baskets to fill and it’s nice that we can continue doing what we have always done - just on a much smaller scale. The baskets hang from the backs of the chairs and face the street. In fall we turn the flowers towards us so we can view them from the living room. The cushions are removed and stored inside. So we drove over to American Plant in search of winter pansies. Before we got to that section we passed by the always colorful sights of the season - pumpkins, gourds, and mums that were everywhere. Many of the pumpkins and gourds were quite creepy looking - not your average round and smooth specimens. Of course there were Halloween decorations too, but I prefer the natural to the man made products. There were fields of mums in all colors. But we don’t have the space for anything like that. Yellow pansies are always a favorite and we ended up picking twelve small containers - four items for each basket. I’m going to leave the spikes and the ivy in and hope to squeeze in the rest of the red and white pansies and violas. Even though it’s a small space it does take time to get it right. So I’ll wait for a sunny day to do the update. I can’t believe summer is over!