LAST WEEK, WE discussed the coming holiday season and how dark gloomy days are here for months to stay! But let’s put in a plug for spring bulbs.
We are still in prime bulb-planting season, so buy and plant them like crazy. But as we move through mid-fall into late fall, let us explore all the possibilities of your seasonal holiday garden.
There is a wide range of plants that can be purchased now for great colors. Heather, holly, kales, cabbages, colored evergreens, viburnum and Dusty Millers are only a few.
Go out, find these items or others that suit your house, and plant them. This is the best time because soil temperatures are still warm, the rains have begun and plants will have several months to adjust and adhere to your native soils before spring.
However, finding and planting these is the simplest part of the seasonal garden. These finely textured, showy fall and winter plants need to be the focal point of a holiday display.
To set off your plants, inside or out, for the holidays, you’ll find it easy being green — evergreen that is. Now is the time to prune away any evergreens that are overgrown, out of shape or have errant growth, but don’t throw the cuttings away.
Use thinning cuts to prune, reaching down into the plant to remove tall, long or in-the-driveway branches. Gather up pruned branches of as many colors, types, textures and varieties as you can amass.
Trade with or prune your neighbor’s trees, with permission, for greater selection. Don’t forget about your friends’ yard, too.
The trick with the next stage is to collect from five to 15 types of greens. Once this beautiful collection of textures and colors is acquired, begin the arrangement.
For example, let’s say you pulled up old marigolds and then planted beautiful parrot tulips in their place. You then planted a couple of nice ornamental kales on top of them. Now, time to move in and place around the base a covering of evergreen cuttings you have the most of. This will create a covering into which you can insert the remaining varieties of greens.
You are literally making an arrangement out of evergreens using the base as an oasis, block or frog.
Take your blue spruce and yellow diadora and stick them into the base ground. Next, use red pine branches to add height and texture. But don’t stop there.
Add some buried holly branches or variegated holly stems. Insert red or yellow dogwood stems.
There is no end to your creativity. Paint artichoke heads gold for a knockout holiday look or use nice long, bright berry branches of pyracanths, which can really add pizzazz.
Even with this gorgeous arrangement, you are still not quite done. You need to cover your place with Christmas lights — not hundreds but thousands. Use lights to really display your creative side.
The best light shows in the country are at botanical gardens. Why? Gardening is all about color, mood, depth, feel and excitement.
Don’t let gray, cold days disparage your garden. Think outside the flower pot!
Now go buy some more lights because you can never have enough. The coming holiday season is a great time of peace and happiness. Let’s all join in lighting up the Peninsula with joy.
Next week, we will discuss how. And come down to the ice skating winter village which opens up Friday, Nov. 21 … and don’t forget to stay well all!
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Andrew May is a freelance writer and ornamental horticulturist who dreams of having Clallam and Jefferson counties nationally recognized as “Flower Peninsula USA.” Send him questions c/o Peninsula Daily News, P.O. Box 1330, Port Angeles, WA 98362, or email news@peninsuladailynews.com (subject line: Andrew May).
