Month: August 2025

Last Day of August, Welcome September

Well another gardening month done. Probably two months to go. Don’t get me wrong, I love flower farming and all my flower lovers, but it has been a bit of a challenging year this year. first with the nonstop rain and the prolonged cold, then the extreme heat, and now the wicked dryness. I have less than 400 gallons of water left in my big tank with no rain in sight. A plus is that the days are shorter, it that a plus? Yup. Less sun on the plants and betters hours for the flower farmer.

But have no fear, the well isn’t dry yet, although I will probably be pulling water from it next week to water the further reaches of the flower farm. Despite the dry, the flowers are still going like crazy and there are plenty of them for all to enjoy. The first of the chrysanthemums are showing nice color, others are showing nice buds. I need to get those beds ready for frost soon. Who knows what the weather has in store for us these days. Back in high school we always had a killing freeze before we went back to school. Now, not until mid October, but who knows. It is better to be prepared than get caught with our pants down, or however that saying goes.

Speaking of chrysanthemums….I have ordered next year’s plugs. Four new varieties plus the ones that you will be enjoying this year when the time comes. I am excited to offer flowers later in the season. I know, silly me. Retirement looks a bit farther down the road…Sorry darling.

The tulips will be rocking in in about six weeks, more or less with a lovely tarrif attached to them. Gulp. Some flower farmers are trying to cancel their orders, some are trying to figure out how to deal with the added price. Me? I am just hoping for the best and I can sell them and cover my costs. I will cross that bridge when I get to it. At least I’m not buying 600,000 bulbs like the larger growers, but still, the tarrif will have to be paid.

On to happier news. I have been enjoying doing my #intentionaltuesdayflowers even though I haven’t been posting them. You get to enjoy them but not instagram yet. I just can’t seem to get around to posting them. Anyway, here is last week’s non posting.

The nice thing about the #intentionaltuesdays is that I do it in the flower shed between flower people and I use the flowers left over from the previous Friday, this way you all get the best flowers, I get to have fun and there is no waste to speak of.

So now we have the #windowframethursday, which I do post on instagram?

Well I think that is enough rambling for today. but before I go I have to show you this tee shirt Steve got for me….

Until next week, Allie. I dream of flowers, do you?

Cooler Weather, Yay!

Last week was a beautiful reprieve from the hot weather. I am sure it will be back soon but the forecast for this week is also going to be cool and I will take it for sure. When the days were so hot this summer it was hard to be in the garden past noon, but now with the cooler weather I am playing catch up with everything that had been put on hold.

So off the list is getting the tunnel cleaned out. When it had been so hot I didn’t even want to go in there because the temperature would have been close to double what it was outside. Not good. On Tuesday because it was cool and drizzly I spent the morning pulling weeds, which there were plenty of, and lifting out the ranunculus corms. The flowers that still looked good I have kept, but everything else is gone. Two tractor bucket loads of crap.

The rest of the week was spent weeding the poor willows and watering them. They look so stressed, but I will give them another deep drink this week and finally get some mulch on them which will really help. I also got that garden mowed so you can even see that there are plants in there. After that I watered the twiggery deeply and finished that weeding, then watered the the external gardens. It is so dry I feel as though I have done nothing but water. If we don’t get rain soon it will be really bad because I only have 650 gallons of water left in my big rain tank. That will only be another 3 big waterings. An inch of rain will go a long ways to filling the rain tank.

I did get some cover crop seed down on Tuesday in the drizzle, only wet enough to get my shoes soaking wet, not enough to get the soil damp, so I am now hand watering the seed so it will germinate. Argh.

Despite the dryness, the flowers are going gangbusters. I am harvesting lots and still have plenty, the insect life is amazing. The garden just hums with happy insects and birds.

I had a disaster Friday, to me anyway. I was liquid feeding the dahlias when my very tangled hose was NOT cooperating, and rather than putting the hose down, walking up the path to get it around the corner I yanked hard, and got the hose to where I wanted it, but…in the process I broke the corner stake and crushed three dahlia plants. I was soooo cranky with myself not to take the time. But, after I finished up, I disconnected everything and took the hose out of the garden and completely straightened it out in the sun and had it relax, then I nicely rolled it back up. A lesson learned? I would like to think so.

So I leave you with last week’s #windowframethursday. Another fun one to make and hopefully for you to enjoy.

It will be another week watering, mulching and harvesting flowers, so until next week, Allie, I dream of flowers…

Week 34 in the Farm Calendar

Here we are at week 34, two thirds of the way through the calendar year, and probably the same for the gardening year. I would say that I have a third or less of the growing season left. Yikes! The weeks move on and the flower varieties continuously change. The snapdragons are done, the annual asters are full bore for this week and maybe next and then they will be gone. Ever changing and that makes it exciting.

The dahlias are really starting to come into their own. More and more varieties are coming in and the number of stems is also increasing. They make such a wonderful focal statement in arrangements, but also act as a great bridge blending colors together. I just love dahlias. More than tulips you might ask? The tulips offer the same colors and floral interest in the spring that the dahlias do in the late summer. I love them both, and they are both hard work and expensive to grow, but in my eyes, so worth it.

Not much new is happening on the farm. I am just trying to keep up with the watering. The cutting gardens are watered on the well, everything else is being hand watered heavily once a week until we start getting some good rain. I still have half a tank of water, but some rain to top that off would be greatly appreciated. Actually as I am writing this we are in New London at the lake having a nice downpour. Enough to make puddles and if this rain gets to Hancock, fingers crossed it would put another weeks worth of watering in the tank.

I have been very good about doing my #intentionalflowerstuesday but not so good about posting them on instagram yet. So here is last week’s non posting. There are two sets here. Same arrangement, two different backgrounds. This whole process is so interesting, one, being intentional with what I am doing, then photographing them…

So these are against the dark wood of the cave… the next are in the cave against a white wall, same arrangement.

Not much of a noticeable difference. Much

So my last is last week’s #windowframethursday. I hope you enjoy these as much as I do creating them…

I am going to pass you off to Steve now. I will be back next week with more flowers and flower news. Hopefully we will get some rain. Until next week. Allie. I dream of flowers.

It’s Gonna be a Hot One

The forecast for this week looks like it is going to be a hot one. Joy. First up on deck will be harvesting before the sun hits the gardens and then filling up the mobile watering tank and water all the plants that are on the verges of the flower field. This will take a number of tankfulls I am sure because some flower farmer who will remain nameless has been pushing the planting boundries and those plants need water. It has been a very dry last few weeks so I need to get on it.

Also because of the heat on Tuesday the flower shed will be in my flower cave. I will remind everyone on the newsletter list on Monday night, but the flowers will appreciate not being in the hot shed.

I got an email from one of the larger importers of tulips, peony roots, and other essential spring plants from the Netherlands and to sum it up, they are anticipating a tarrif of15% on goods shipped over this fall. Up, that includes the tulip bulbs that I ordered back in March. There is nothing I can do, or they can do…everyone hopes that everyone involved will come to their senses. If not, the floral industry is going to take a really big hit. Globally, not just me. Let’s keep our fingers crossed that an agreement is reached before the tulip shipment.

My biggest accomplishment last week was getting the twiggery weeded. Steve mowed the paths for me which was a termendous help, then I just weeded and tidied. When you drive in now you can actually see the shrubs, and despite the weeds and lack of watering they are looking really good. Yay!

I am being really good about doing my Tuesdays intentional designs and photography. I am now going to post them and they will be under #intentionalflowertuesday. I will also show them here. Here is last week’s…

So I sent this photo off to a friend, and she commented back about the beautiful celosia. I replied that I had a bunch of different varieties this year and sent along photos of each variety. The comment back was about this orange one, which I think is Burnt Embers would be hard to work with.

I then paired it with three different dahlias, and see what it does.

I find the color play fascinating. What do you think?

So, here is the last floral of the evening. Last week’s #windowframethursday

I am going to pass you off to Steve now…so until next week, Allie. I dream of flowers, do you?

One last photo, taken at the fountain outside the kitchen window the other night.

Have I Ever Told You?

How much I love flowers? Just in case you didn’t know, I do. I really do, and I love my little flower farm.

I was listening to a year 4 flower farmer who is changing things up for their farm, no surprise, we all do that. It is part of the growth of flower farming. But something they said struck a sad chord for me. The said that you aren’t a flower farm unless you only grow 8 crops and grow them well. Everything else is just ‘gardening’. Well, I must differ with them, because it really depends on what one’s market is, and my market is selling the variety of flowers that I do to create arrangements and bouquets that are beautiful and unusual. More gardenesque than a bunch of sunflowers, zinnias and statice. I hope this is why you love my flowers as well. Oh well. Every business is different, but they should learn about not being so arrogant and negative about other small growers.

So since I do grow so much of everything damnit, I went and ordered more plants today. The autumn rains will hopefully be coming next month which is the perfect time for planting. Lots of good root growth with less top growth stress. I ordered more peonies, only 9, and I have just enough space for them as well as a couple of late spring perennials and summer perennials. This fall I have some jiggering of the garden to do, rearranging the existing plants, removing some plants that just are’t cutting it, as well as planting the new plants. That as well as the usual autumn stuff like cutting back and putting down leaf mulch and hopefully mulching the paths with wood chip. Oh, I also ordered more hyacinths for forcing and some dutch iris to try to go along with the tulips next year. It is going to be one crowded cooler this winter.

I have been busy working on my floral work, trying to be more intentional as you know, as well as working on photographing them. So I now have Tuesdays Intentionals, and Thursdays Windowframe. This will be an interesting exercise, but fun. Come join me in the ‘fun’.

Two days later…I have last weeks #windowframethursday. This one is totally different. They were made to go to the Waterhouse Restaurant, the little one goes along with it.

Like I said, very different. I grew a handful of lilies this year, not that I am a big lily fan because they need a big vase to look their best, but I has been fun working with them.

It will be a busy week on the farm this week, playing catch up from the last few weeks extreme heat. Mowing, watering the outlying areas and maybe even finally getting around to mulching the willowery.

Steve is back, we can all breath a big sigh.

Until next week. Allie. I dream of flowers, do you?