The spring pot - year three - margarita tulips, mascari and lilac wonder

My annual spring pot, crowned with some smashing margarita tulips

So I vanished. At the end of last year I abruptly stopped posting. The simple fact of the matter is I just didn't feel like it, lots of things were changing and my blog was a casualty of the process. But that doesn't mean I haven't been busy gardening! Nothing could put me off that, and now things have calmed down a bit I thought it would be fitting to come back to where it all started two years ago with my annual spring pot.

To set the scene every year in autumn the mother and I head to a garden centre, buy up half the bulbs and spend an afternoon trying to cram them all in the one pot. Its quite an art, like putting together crazy paving, and I must confess I leave the actual hard work of planting to my mother.

Mascara and scilla siberica alba   

But I do have a hand in its design, which is why last year it was an abysmal failure. I can't remember all in the ins and outs, but the general gist was some of the bulbs lied and made out they would fit into a blue and orange colour scheme when they were shocking red. It did not look good.

And you know what, I really wished I had gone pink last year, so this year I have embraced the somewhat feminine shade wholeheartedly. I think we have set the record for the number of varieties within the pot this year, at eight, and despite all the bulbs being crammed in there like commuters in Victoria underground station in rush hour, everything has come up just fine.

The real star of the show has been the lustrously dark pink Margarita tulips which are standing slightly above the rest of the flowers and really commanding attention. Its a really super variety, so much so I'm actually going to try and identify the bulbs to try and keep for next year. The wind has snapped off a couple but they are brightening up the kitchen windowsill instead now.

Early colour came from the combination of the blue chionodoxa forbesii and scilla siberica alba, and this blue and white combination has been carried through by my beloved mascara. I went back to my favourite blue latifolium variety with their contrasting top-nots, and for the first time this year I also threw in some white ones in the form of white magic. They are really unapologetically white, which is rather pleasing and just popping up between all the foliage now.

If anything in the pot is a bit 'meh' its the narcissus tresamble, but at the end of the day when competing with the likes of margarita and tulip lilac wonder there really is only so much a fairly simple white daffodil can do. It does add contrast though. Lilac wonder aren't remotely lilac but are instead a lovely shade of pink with delightfully eggs yellow centres. I do love a bit of yellow in the mix.

And lastly I was going to I can't really remember seeing tulip little beauty, but looking at my pictures I realise that is because they haven't actually come out yet! So still things to look forward too.

Margarita tulips

Planting spring bulbs - pink tulips and muscari

I hate this time of year with a passion. Every day when I get home from work its dark and freezing and on my one gardening day of the week, Saturday, it without fail rains. Nothing is growing with any great speed and im stuck inside no doubt feeding my face. The whole situation is thoroughly depressing. But there is one silver lining. Its bulb planting season! And this means I can be frivolous with my credit card and plan wondrous displays.

And frivolous I most certainly have been. My credit card has gone for a lay down. Although the bulbs in today's post I ironically didn't buy. Today we are talking the spring pot. The infamous pot that the mother crams as many bulbs in as physically possible and always turns out stunning. How all the little 'fellas', as bulbs are in my mothers eyes, manage to fight and elbow their way to the top I don't know, but despite being layered up like a cake they do.

This is a flavour of last years' rather red and blue pot 

I have been over how the pot gets planted in the past, most people know how its done, so im just going to focus on the planting scheme. I wasn't so thrilled with this years pot, too much sun ruined the timings and the colour palette of orange and blue didn't work out quite as well as I had hoped. I expressed an interest in doing a nice girly pink pot as it started wilting. Because everybody likes a bit of pink in the spring. Well I have delivered.

Next years pot will be pink, white and blue if it turns out as the packets promise. Which nobody can guarantee! And it should be absolutely stuffed. Im not sure we have ever put so many bulbs into one pot before, but no doubt it will still work. As ever the only rule for the spring pot is anything that goes in it must be an early bloomer.

If my memory serves me correctly now nestled right at the bottom is narcissus 'tresamble'. There has to be a daffodil of some kind in the pot and I chose tresamble because it should be near enough white. I like a nice white clean daffodil, and I didn't want too much yellow. Knowing my luck it will be full on cream.

Next up is Margarita. She is a big blousey pink tulip which should bring a nice feminine feel to proceedinsgs. She isn't our usual style for the pot, we normally go for something more striking and structural but its nice to have something different.

Carrying on the pink theme is tulipa 'lilac wonder' which is a worrying name for something that promises to be pink. I really like the look of these, small cup-shaped pink flowers with really bright egg-yellow centres. In my mind these will be the real stars of the show.

One of my absolute favourite spring flowers which I have spouted endlessly about before is muscari. These are literal perfection in my eyes. Anything that looks like a tiny bunch of blue grapes is great in my eyes. Which is why I have bought them in white. No, I have never tried the white ones before so I was obviously itching to give them a go. I have never even seen a white one but they will fit in with the theme of the pot nicely and hopefully I will love them.

But you can't just have muscari in white so the variety with the contrasting top knot are back too. Last year I grew a plain blue variety which I wasn't so keen on so I have gone back to my original favourites. The top knots get me every time. Can't wait.

Basically everything in this pot thats pink is a tulip and little beauty is no different. I feel this little cherub of a flower is what ties all the rest of bulbs together. These tulips contain each of the colours in the pot; white, pink and blue. The combination promises to be quite striking, even though they are only small in stature.

Finally the top layer contains two quite similar small flowers. Scilla siberica alba and chionodoxo forbesii. One is blue with white centres and one is just plain white. And thats all I have to say about them because they are really very similar. But also no doubt lovely when they flower.

We planted all the bulbs one sunny saturday in late October so all we have to do now is sit back and wait for for the magic to happen. Indoors preferably.

narcissi - jonquilla pipit, minnow, and the unknown

Typically one of the narcissi I was most impressed by this year was one I threw in right at the end just because I was feeling frivolously spendy.  I didn't have high hopes for anything spectacular.  Jonquilla pipit is just like your regular see-it-everywhere daffodil except its back to front.  The trumpet is lighter and the petals are yellow.  How impressive can it be? I asked myself.

Jonquilla pipit, nice sized flowers with lovely white trumpets set against bright yellow petals

The thing about daffodils is, they always have the capacity to surprise me. Thats a joke, providing the advertising graphics are vaguely accurate, which is my pet peeve, there is little doubt what will burst forth from the soil.  But I was surprised just how much i liked them.

See not all of the flowers quite got the colour brief, the bottom one is
completely yellow

The trumpet wasn't just pale, it was the perfect milky shade of white.  And for such a simple straightforward colour switch, it did manage to stand out amongst the vivid oranges and heavy frills of its fellow patio occupants.  However, not all the flowers have quite stuck to this theory, and as the photo below shows, some of the flowers were delightfully stripey as the colour runs between them.  This added just a little bit more interest, if any was needed, and some variety.  Im totally sold on it and can't wait to grow it again next year.

Beautiful stripey petals, love this, not sure why it doesn't manage to be consistent, but thats nice

Any long term followers of this blog may recognise this frilly wonder as they are not a fresh addition.  These are the mother's and she managed to keep them from last year so that we got to enjoy their stunning display again.  I absolutely love these, if I could choose only one narcissi out of all of my growings this year, it would probably be this one, if im truly honest with myself.

The unknown joy that is this narcissi, I love the colour, the formation,
the smell, its all good.

Unfortunately I still don't know its name, but it does bear uncanny resemblance to a large tub of salted caramel icecream I spent some quality time eating last weekend.  These look as tasty as the icecream was.

Frilly and fragrant

I remember mid April these absolutely stank.  I know your not meant to say that about something that smells nice, but these truly honked.  A good honk, but a honk non-the-less.  The mother and I spent some time one evening out in the semi-darkness sniffing them, getting a good nose-full of the pungent aroma.

Look at that shot of colour, like toffee sauce on cream

The last narcissi in my stocks is minnow.  This is a sweet little thing, multiple dainty flower heads on skinny stems.  This does not hog the attention when amongst other pots, but is lovely to bend down and have an intimate look at on the way past.  There isn't a lot to say about minnow, because to be fair, there is not a lot to it.  Small but perfectly formed with the tiniest trumpets ever, these are super cute.  I wouldn't recommend minnow over any of the others, but if one has a spare pot, why not.

And thats it!  All my narcissi covered for the year.  Next autumn I am definitely going to treat myself to some really special narcissi varieties that you can only buy over the internet, can't wait.

Small and delightful, minnow does it well

Spring flowers - Muscari and euphorbia

My favourite spring flower - muscari.  I just love them anywhere

It seems spring has finally sprung, at long long last.  I began to feel like I might never see the sun again and it hasn't even been that bad a winter.  With the spring comes one of my favourite little flowers.  It may be small, but boy is it perfectly formed.  Muscari, commonly referred to as grape hyacinths, are literally little bright blue bunches of grapes on a stems.  I love them in pots, I love them in sways, I will take a grape hyacinth if it popped out of anywhere.

For this reason they are a firm fixture in this years spring pot.  But they are not the only grape hyacinths in our garden now.  The mother, I love the woman, but she just can't throw anything away.  So instead of chucking away last years spring pot bulbs she dug a trench under the hedge at the bottom of the garden and stuffed them all in there in the hope that we might get a second display.  A second display is exactly what we have got.  There are a few red tulips, a few mini daffodils, but far more importantly, my favourite type of muscari.

My favourite type, a little smaller and more delicate but with two colours

I just love these little guys with their contrasting little topknots.  I would say I prefer them to the ones I bought this year, Il have to keep this in mind for buying bulbs for next year.

What a daffodil! Peachy, frilly, big and blousy.  There is nothing not to love
about this specimen 

Another bulb I am thrilled to see again is this fabulous daffodil.  What a beauty, I love the contrast in colours and the interesting structure.  Its just a shame I have to duck down under a tree and virtually climb behind a bush to see it, but its so worth the effort.  Last year we had three bulbs of this beauty, but this year its been reduced to just one.  Clearly the mother didn't keep them right over the summer.

I love a good muscari on mass, they make such a pretty carpet of blue

Something I rather enjoy doing on a boring afternoon is wandering the streets of a neighbourhood looking at peoples gardens.  Odd but true.  I just like nosing at what other people do, Im not expecting to see anything groundbreaking but its all interesting.  One garden had a lovely swathe of grape hyacinths. While I am clearly besotted with this little flower I don't have the room to let these little guys do what they really should: create a little blue sea across a patch of green.  This one garden on my trip had really done this well.  Grape hyacinths should always be grown with friends.

Finally moving on from my favourite subject another joy were these euphorbia plants.  Towering high above my diminutive height in a great clumping bush, these vibrant lime green plants really struck the eye.   I really enjoy the structure of this plant with its little disks stuck out on tiny stalks.  Reminds me of a famous textile designer I had to study at uni. I personally wouldn't want one, but I enjoy it in other people's gardens.

Euphorbia is a funny plant really, its all so green! I really like the shape of what I imagine are the flowers though, little disks on stalks.  This garden looked great with these great lime green clouds

Lastly was this strange beast.  I will happily admit I have absolutely no idea what this plant is, I have never seen it before as far as I know.  I love round things so the perfectly cylindrical hanging fruits/seeds/things? appeal greatly.  It was a very tall plant but very striking one.