A Flower Farm Update Blooming Into Spring
It’s been a while since I’ve written about everything I have been doing to grow our flower farm, but with spring arriving and so many gorgeous seasonal flowers ready to be picked, it seems like the ideal time for an update.
Over summer we had some very large gum trees fall down. We’re still trying to tidy up after them, but the change means that what was once a very shaded area is now full sun. In the same area, we also moved a fence further out into the paddock and have planted more Magnolia and Michaelia trees for foliage.
Foliage is something we always need so, so much of. As we keep getting busier and send our fresh flower bouquets nationwide, we need even more of it! Our foliage-only Paddock to Posie Foliage Bouquet is also very popular, full of different textures and often fragranced stems like scented geranium.
Many of our flowers are grown within garden beds rather than in long rows of just one type of flower. This creates biodiversity, which I believe is an important part of growing healthy plants, especially as we are completely spray-free.
Over winter we have been building a couple of new flower beds. One is a little more shaded and includes more hellebores and hydrangeas, daphne (what a glorious fragrance this has over the winter months when it flowers!), pieris, wallflowers, rose lilies and so much more.
The other new garden is my Velvet Garden. It’s meant to be full of deep, rich colours and textures like burgundy and burnt oranges. It has iris, more hellebores, rice flower, bronze fennel, lobelia, Astrantia, Royal Red buddleia and lilies, and will soon have dahlia tubers and lots of summer annuals added too.
Some Spring Firsts
There are also a few flowers I’ve grown for the first time this spring that I’m already picking:
- Stock – incredibly gorgeous, and the fragrance is simply divine.
- Ranunculus – these are such divas! I love them and all their beautiful ruffles, but I also find them soooo fussy to grow.
- Gladioli nanus – a smaller version of gladioli and the perfect size for both our posies and our flower bouquets.
My New She Shed
Over the summer I moved into an old garden shed that was missing a door and full of old pipes, stakes and heaven only knows what!!
It took quite a bit to clean and tidy it, and then I moved in – well, I should say I turned it into my new She Shed.
Everything in it was repurposed and I love it. It’s just big enough for one, with a nice seat and a stack of books next to it, if I ever stopped long enough to sit down and read! In fact, I think one of the cats enjoys it more than I do.
There’s a bench for sowing seeds and a very special vintage ladder from my father, which I have hanging horizontally so I can tie bunches of flowers from it to dry.
It was full of statice drying over summer and will shortly be full of rice flower and hellebores. These dried flowers will then become part of our Everlasting Paddock to Posie.
Paddock to Posie Is Back in Bloom
Our Paddock to Posie range, made using only flowers from our own flower farm, is now available for more of the year.
The single-variety seasonal flowers are available almost all year round now, as there is nearly always something blooming throughout the seasons.
Our mixed posies and bouquets have just become fully available again too, now that we have so many spring blooms ready to pick and turn into simply gorgeous arrangements.
These have to be my favourite. They’re full of flowers grown with love on our flower farm and are completely spray-free – so you can thrust your nose into the sweet peas or daffodils and know that you’ll only encounter goodness… and maybe the odd ladybird!!
Until my next ramblings,
Grown and written with love,
Melanie
