I am not a big fan of Hosta flowers but sometimes they call out to be used in an arrangement.
The bowl is bored by Allium 'Summer Beauty' which grows in abundance in my garden.
The central display are flowers from smaller Hostas like 'Golden Tiara' and 'Feather Boa.'
Almost any type of summer blooming lily is tall and needs a vase to match if you want to display them indoors. This glass vase is perfect for one tall stem, which I think is also the perfect way to showcase these drama queens. This one is Lilium lancifolium flore pleno.
This stem on this Veronicastrum virginicum 'Fascination' had broken, so I clipped it off along with some Astrantia that needed cutting back.
Before i knew it, I had a vase full of flowers.
As most of the filler plants in this vase are a week old, I aded assorted Geraniums and a few Heuchera flowers to perk things up.
I need to go out in the garden with my clippers, but without a plan, more often.
Suddenly the house was empty of flowers and yet another rain storm was on the way. So I went out to see what I could find.
The Martagon lilies were on the downside but I brought a few indoors anyway. The Alliums were also past their peak. I don't have many, but as they no longer provided a worthy note to the garden scene, I clipped them as well.
The Heuchera flowers were just starting. I love this unknown variety with long stems and lots of flowers. They made the bouquet for me.
The fact that the lilies started dropping petals almost immediately proved their sad condition.
Carex muskingumensis (palm sedge) is way too happy in my bog garden. Lest it try to take over even more space, I pulled all the seedheads off. In fact, I pulled most of them before I thought to take a picture of what a "waving wheat" moment they offered in the early morning sunlight.
Looking at my handfuls of lovely seedheads, I decided they should get their moment to star — but in a vase rather than the garden.
I set a jam jar full of water inside the pot to keep them looking good as long as possible.
I paired them with the dried up foliage of a stem from my Rhododendron yakushimanum 'Yaku Angel'
Shadowy perfection.
My neighbor's beautiful Clematis is growing through the fence that separates our gardens.
It was too beautiful to resist cutting what was growing on my side.
I'd been looking at one of my Ikebana books and saw an arrangement with a piece of bark. Since I'd just found such an item in the garden, it all came together quickly and rather nicely to my eye.
I quickly put these vases together Sunday afternoon as rain was forecast for Monday and a high of 90°F on Tuesday. I knew that one/two punch might easily end both of these blooms.
A thunderstorm with possible tornados was forecast for Saturday for our area. So I cut a lot of flowers for the house, knowing they would be a mess if we did get a big storm. We got .57" (1.44 cm.) of rain and the next day the temperature shot up to 83°F. (28.33°C.), so I was glad I grabbed some blooms at the optimum moment.
Muscari pardoxum, an 1880 heirloom variety in the rear vase; Muscari ''Valerie Finnis; in the foreground with Brunnera.
Muscari pardoxum flowers are a very dark blue with pale yellow interiors visible as they open.
This rogue Muscari, colored bright purple, is most likely M. botryoides.
This vase is fun to use because you can put a different flower in each opening and it has different illustrations on the front and back.
Tulips demand to be brought indoors where they can be enjoyed up close.
Tulip 'Rococo' has petals highlighted with purple, yellow and green.
I bought this vase when Madison's Studio Paran closed. I knew those red lines would be perfect with Tulips.
In southern Wisconsin, Lily of the Valley (Convallaria majalus) typically bloom for Mother's Day. This year they missed that date by a week.
They deserve a special vase like this old Mercury glass container and just the right foliage accompaniment.
Despite their later appearance, I opted to display them with a photo of my mother, myself and two of my sisters. I believe my mom may be pregnant with my youngest sister in this photo.
Our dangerously low overnight temperatures mean that all my special plants are being protected with bins and boxes. Tonight looks like our last day with a freezing overnight low temp, 32°F.
I have been holding all the plants that have arrived by mail or curbside pickup at local nurseries in a wheelbarrow and boxes so they can be quickly brought indoors at night and returned outside during the day time hours. But yesterday, I gave up and brought everyone inside mid-afternoon when it started to snow. It came down heavily enough that it began to stick to the deck and covered the roof of the fence across the back garden.
The living room is the holding spot for herbs and a few perennials.
The wheelbarrow in the garage has Epimediums, Tricyrtis and Veronicastrums.
The front hall is packed with everything else . . .
including this Rhodie atlanticum that has started to bloom.
Luckily I took advantage of more pleasant weather Saturday afternoon and clipped enough flowers to put together an assortment of vases.
This Tulip and the Muscari grow in full sun in gravelly soil in the traffic island bed in the street. I plant and maintain this little bed which is directly in front of my house.
I have a trio of white pitchers that Ipurchased because I loved their shapes and thought they would be perfect as vases. But photographing them as a group is always difficult, between finding the room to pose all three together and enough light to show their contents in their true colors.
They are filled with Daffodils, Tulip sylvestnis, Epimedium, Fritillaria, Lamium and a Peony.
I opened the window shutters to increase the light!
A pair of Tulip 'Schoonoord' circle Paeonia japonica with Hyacinth 'City of Haarlem' in the rear.
To see what other gardeners have put in a vase today, visit Cathy at Rambling in the Garden who hosts this lively and lovely Monday meme.
The Hellebore leaves are full up and covering the fading flowers. But I can never just cut those stems and toss the flowers onto the compost pile; thus this vase. Most of these blossoms are H. 'New York Night'. I always thought the color and the name were the essence of big city sophistication. These days it just sounds doleful.
The tall greenish flower with red edges is H. "Jade Tiger' and the shorter green blooms are H. niger.
But it is the two-toned grape hyacinths (Muscari latifolium) that bring it all to life.
We have a rabbit family living under our deck and my attempts to trap them have not yielded anything. So I cut these tulips as soon as I saw them to save them from the bunnies. I don't know when I've brought tulips into the house that they did not suddenly open widely. So this vase this morning is much more restrained than I expected it to be.
Linking to Rambling in the Garden, who hosts this most enjoyable Monday meme where you can see all sorts of spring garden flowers in vases.