Hawleyblog

More Flowers of Fall

The first kind of flower I bought after my last flowers post was ageratum. I was apparently so excited about finding a cocoon or chrysalis in the bouquet that I forgot to take a picture of the flowers themselves. They were more lavender than blue. I kept the cocoon inside my living room to see whether the insect inside would emerge. Unfortunately, it didn't. There were beautiful golden spots in two different places on the outside of the cocoon.

The next time, I bought butterfly weed. Which didn't have any cocoons on it.

I wasn't thrilled with any of the photos I took. And the milky sap produced by this member of the milkweed family was annoying to deal with when I trimmed the stems.

Two weekends ago, I had a better time with my pairing of cosmos and globe amaranth.

 

I've been doing a lot of pairings this fresh-flower season. They wouldn't win me first prize on Top Flower Arranger, if there were such a reality show, but I'm digging most of them a good deal. This past weekend, I paired plumed celosia with dahlias.

The Last Flowers of Summer and the First Flowers of Fall

A few weekends ago, when Matt and Mike were visiting, I got some cockscomb and cosmos, because the guys both liked one of them. They went together better than this not-so-great picture would indicate.

The next weekend, I bought and "arranged" another example of the mishmash of sunflowers that I'm so fond of.

The next weekend was all about the peonies.

Then I got some gorgeous dark-red and white dahlias.

Two weekends ago, my usual flower people at the Saturday Greenmarket had a whole lot of dried hydrangeas.

I paired up my favorite combo of the summer, orange calendulas and yellow plumed celosia.

Some of the calendulas had bright-red centers. They brought to mind those butter cookies with the jam in the center.

They were my last flowers of the summer.

The first flowers of fall this past Saturday were these frilly marigolds.

More Flowers of Summer

At the Union Square Greenmarket yesterday, I was going to buy these gorgeous red-and-yellow sunflowers from The River Garden of Catskill, New York.

Until I realized I'd never seen such gorgous multicolored marigolds—in all kinds of yellows, oranges, and reds—and so I had to buy them instead.

On the way to the subway, the lisianthus at another farmstand caught my eye, but I didn't buy them too.

On Wednesday of the previous week, I went a little crazy over the sunflowers that Oak Grove Plantation of Pittsgrove, New Jersey, had brought to the Union Square market. The bunches were $10 apiece or three for $27. I don't know why, but that sounded like a deal I couldn't turn down. I got one lemon-yellow bunch and two with all different kinds of yellow and gold ones.

I put together a nice arrangement in my big clear-glass vase and gave the rest to Bob and Jen.

The week before that, I got cosmos from my usual flower peeps at the Grand Army Plaza market on Saturday. In my bunch, there were some pink ones that looked distressed with white, like a worn pair of jeans.

And a white one that had the most subtle hints of pink.

Here's the whole bouquet.

And finally, the Saturday before that, I got a bunch of red dahlias and a bunch of green zinnias.

And I made a Christmasy-looking arrangement that Rudy poked his nose toward as I was taking a picture.

The Flowers of Summer

Yesterday's flowers from the Greenmarket: red and white asters. 

 

The week before that, I thought about getting blackberry lilies, whose name comes from the appearance of its seed clusters, not its flowers:

But I wanted a nice and showy bouquet, something to cheer me up when I came home late from work during my busiest week of the production cycle. And the "lilies," which are really irises, didn't look like they'd put on much of a show. It is fun that the flowers twist themselves up once they're done for, though.

Instead, I got two different bunches of flowers: green-colored zinnias and green lace flowers.

 

I went with that combo mainly because of the gorgeous zinnia at right in the top photo. Unfortunately, I didn't trim any of the flowers nor give them a fresh cut until just before I went to bed that Sunday, and the zinnias suffered for it. I had to compost all but three. At least the prettiest one survived. The green lace flowers look like Queen Anne's lace but I don't know whether that's what they are. Some of the flower clusters were greenish-white, and some were white-white. I couldn't find much on the Google to help me out; I found a lot of embroidery and craft sites instead. And I found this pretty variety of primula.

Those suckers went to seed really fast. A bunch of the seeds ended up on top of my entertainment unit. And when I shook the flowers on my fire escape, another mess of seeds rained down.

And speaking of lacy flowers, I took a picture of some really purty blue flowers that looked sorta lacy in the neighborhood a little while ago.

The week before that, I had on display some sunflowers that I got from Mood's Farm Market on the way back home from Gran's house. The gal who waited on me was supersweet and wrapped a wet paper towel around the ends of the stems to help keep the flowers happy. I don't know when I'll be passing by there next, but if I want to pick up something at a farm market on the way to or back from Gran's (and I pass by several on my route), I'll be stopping at Mood's. Customer service!

I love the ones that are all yellow except for the green center.

And the week before that, I bought calendula and yellow yarrow.

And finally, I went back and took some more photos of the tulip tree once the flowers had dropped and the seed pods had formed. I love that buttery lighting at the top.

A Flowers Post With More Tulip Tree Blooms and Some Stuff I'm Actually Growing Myself

The endless rain we've been having hasn't been good for the plants in my alleyway. The geranium Mitch and Jon gave me was looking like ass, and some of the leaves on the Sun Gold tomato plant I'm keeping an eye on for Abbe have been turning yellow.

When Jen took Abbe to Take Your Kids to Work Day a little while back, all of the kids who went to the taping of The Martha Stewart Show got a tomato plant. And it was the best kind of tomato plant possible: Sun Golds—those delicious, very sweet, orange, cherry-size tomatoes—are a favorite of both Jen's and mine. In fact, putting me in charge of the Sun Golds is like putting Republicans in charge of the pension fund. But I promise to try to hope to be good and not eat them all. ;-)

Today, I followed through on my bright idea to move the tomato plant under the part of the fire escape that's underneath the large mat in front of my door. And I hung up the geranium again. I'd taken it down a while back when we were supposed to get some strong winds. First, though, I plucked a lot of yellowed stems, gooey leaves, and dead flowers from it. Geranium stems come off real easy, as if they're segmented and meant to break away. Like the velcro-fastened pants I usually wear when I know Matthew is coming over.

Several weeks ago, I'd gotten red and yellow calibrachoas at the farmers market. The yellow one shriveled up, so I bought a new one at the farmers market yesterday and planted it with my red one in a different pot today. I seem to recall losing a plant last year to what I assumed was a fungus in the same pot where the yellow calibrachoa bit the dust. And it may very well have been a calibrachoa. Maybe I should discard that dirt.

I'm also growing some mimuluses, most of which are predominantly red. The ones with more yellow on them haven't thrived like the red ones—I see a pattern forming here—and the red ones have taken over. See, here are the yellow ones practically falling out of the pot.

Mimuluses are also known as monkey faces. Mine don't look especially like simians, but they've got neat patterns.

My daylilies, bucking the trend of yellow-tinged failures, came back nicely again this year.

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This week's flowers from the market are gaillardias.

Last week, I got some hesperis, which is also known as Dame's Rocket, and some veronica, which is aka Speedwell. I thought they'd look nice together, and I had so many stems that I had to make two arrangements. I like the one in the smaller vase better because the veronica has a chance to assert itself.

And a couple of weeks ago, I bought some cornflowers at the Friday market in Union Square.

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A couple weeks ago, I took some more photos of that tulip tree in Prospect Park, including a closeup of one of the fully opened blooms.

The color scheme of these flowers I saw in a yard on 9th Street is reminiscent of the tulip tree's. It was raining the day I took this photo too.

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And now a hodgepodge of photos to wrap up the post:

A boatload of gerbera daisies at the market

A purty yard on 9th Street with an arched trellis

And in a neighbor's yard, pink buds open into white flowers with red stripes.

Flowers! Flowers! Flowers! And Still More Flowers!

I love peonies because I associate them with my Granny, who has a lot of them in her yard. They're also simply gorgeous in bud or full bloom, and they have a wonderful and not overpowering smell. I bought these white ones with touches of red from the flower lady at my local Greenmarket Saturday.

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I haven't done a flowers-from-the-Greenmarket post all spring, so I've got a lot to catch up on. I think the first ones I bought there last month were some really cool blueberry branches. The flowers are cute, bell-shaped white things. Hmm. Cute, bell, white. That reminds me of Hunter. :-)

I think these tulips came next:

And then these peach tree branches, which I found rather difficult to photograph:

And these lilacs, which I couldn't seem to take a good picture of, so I pumped up the lilac tinting and made it all artsy. And maybe slightly headache inducing.

And finally, before the peonies, I got some lovely alstroemeria from a farmer at the Union Square Greenmarket who also had some gorgeous roses and snapdragons.

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Bob got some purty mums a couple of weeks ago. Maybe he was hoping that buying flowers would increase his chances of getting some action. These are very pretty, but if I were Jen, I'd hold out for at least some carnations. Hah!

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And now, some flowers in yards in my hood:

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Someone who lives at Carroll Street and Fiske Place here in the Slope pruned a tree so that it would form an arch over the sidewalk. Well done! It's actually been that way since I've lived in the neighborhood, but I hadn't thought to take any pix of it until now.

Here's its trunk:

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And finally, I took some pictures of buds and blooms on a tulip tree in the park. I would have sworn I'd written about tulip trees on here before, but I couldn't find any such posts when I did a search just now. The tulip tree, aka the tulip poplar, is the largest deciduous tree in the Eastern United States, and the flowers are quite cool looking.

In my living room, I have a woodblock print of a "Tulip Tree in Bloom" that I bought a few years ago at a gallery in Millville:

A Loads-of-Spring Flowers-and-Leaves Post, Part II

Here are the last of my recent photos of springtime plants and their parts. (Until my overdue post about the flowers I've been buying at the farmers markets.) And speaking of "spring" and "parts," I really do think I get more excitement in my special parts in spring. Nature isn't the only thing that's awakening with new liveliness, if you know what I mean. In fact, Nathan, you might want to look down right about now. Because that's no dog humping on your leg.*

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I've loved grape hyacinths since I was a kid. Granny and Pop Pop had loads of them in their yard. And Dad said this weekend that there are still lots left. I took these pictures outside buildings near work and near my home.

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These flowering bulbs were for sale at the Union Square Greenmarket on Friday.

*As if Nathan Fillion would have decided, "Oh, that's just a dog humping my leg. No need to take a look or do anything about it."

A Loads-of-Spring Flowers-and-Leaves Post

I've been going overboard taking photos of flowers and leaves—some of them as they were emerging, including one below that looks very much like a human hand. I've got spring fever, baby! And I've got so many pictures, I'm going to have to do this post in at least a couple of installments.

A Touch-of-Spring Flowers Post

Dutch irises in a nearby yard

I asked Will to help me identify this bush I saw here in Park Slope. His first guess was Pieris japonica, which I think looks to be correct. I have to link to this page too but only because I'm getting a kick out of the phrase "hanging or semi-erect panicles."

Lots of panicles, in close-up

Crocuses that are almost ready to burst open

Probably the Last Flower Post of the Season

On Saturday, I got some calendulas at the Greenmarket. I was surprised to see them. The week before, the only fresh "flowers" the flower lady had were cabbage roses. When I talked to my Dad on Saturday, he said some of his marigolds, which are related to calendulas, were still hanging in there, though he said he hadn't checked on them in a couple of days, since the extremely cold temeratures hit last week.

The previous two weeks, I got cabbage roses.

The "petals" look beautiful up close when parts of them turn yellow; I like the combination of green, yellow, and purple. They don't smell too nice, though.