In a Vase on Monday: Itsy Bitsy tangles with the queen of flowers

A friend of mine stopped by on Saturday with gifts, including peonies!  The same market that offers peonies in late spring/early summer now has "winter peonies" so of course I had to use them in a vase this Monday.  She brought two sleeves of peonies in different colors but, as one group opened far more quickly than the other, I ended up displaying them in separate vases.

I partnered the peony blooms with Gomphrena 'Itsy Bitsy' and foliage from my garden.  According to legend, peonies are the queen of flowers (or king or empress, depending upon the source).

Back view: I cut so many of the spindly 'Itsy Bitsy' stems, they repeatedly got tangled with the peonies and themselves, hence the title of this post

Top view

From left to right: Gomphrena decumbens 'Itsy Bitsy', noID peonies, and Prunus caroliniana

The peonies in the second vase were still stubbornly curled in tight balls on Sunday afternoon but I'm expecting they'll open overnight.

These peonies were also paired with 'Itsy Bitsy' and the same foliage

Contrary to expectations, my garden produced yet another Lisianthus (Eustoma grandiflorum) bloom so, to celebrate its persistence, I constructed another arrangement around it.

I collected a range of blue and purple blooms to accent the dark blue Lisianthus

Back view

Top view

Clockwise from the upper left: noID Ceanothus, Eustoma grandiflorum, Lavandula multifida, Osteospermum 'Violet Ice', Prostanthera ovalifolia 'Variegata', and Trichostemma 'Midnight Magic'

I showed a single photo of a wreath I constructed from scratch (my first ever!) in my Friday post but, thinking that members of the IAVOM community were perhaps most likely to appreciate the process, I saved the details for this post.

From left to right, the main ingredients were cuttings of Leucadendron salignum 'Chief', berries of Nandina domestica paired with stems of Coleonema pulchellum 'Sunset Gold', and Leucadendron 'Winter Red'.  I tied the cuttings tightly together using fishing line.  In retrospect, I should have made more and smaller bundles of each material to create a denser wreath.

I used a wire frame I'd saved from a store-bought wreath purchased last year.  When I started, I hadn't planned to add the red berries or chartreuse Coleonema.  I placed two Leucadendron 'Chief' bundles for each 'Winter Sun' bundle, wrapping the wire around each bundle hree times before overlapping it with the next one.  I didn't cut the wire until I'd covered the entire frame.

I was fairly pleased with it when I reached this phase but I decided I needed some bright spots of red, which is when I assembled the berry bundles.  I wired these in separately but it would have been better to have wired in everything at the same time, as well as using smaller bundles of materials to create a denser wreath.

Luckily, I had some chartreuse ribbon on hand.  I watched an online video about making a bow with multiple loops.  Stiffer ribbon would have worked better in this instance.

This is the finished wreath.  Knowing what I do now, next time I'll: create smaller bundles of materials (about 4 inches long), alternate bundles facing in and out, and wire all materials as part of one continuous process.  As this wreath has dried out rapidly indoors, I think I'll also place it outdoors if possible.

All material © 2012-2020 by Kris Peterson for Late to the Garden Party