THE STRAW THAT BROKE THE CAMEL'S BACK

This is the one, this is the plant combination that broke the camel's back, this is the one that has made me officially soften my stance on my strictly colour-coded gardens.

Sea Holly and Liatris make for a fantastic combination in both colour and form.

I have been headed in this direction since reading Piet Oudolf's absolutely fantastic book this winter, 

Planting: A New Perspective. After he proclaimed that understanding why anyone would rely primarily on colour as the foundation of their garden design was beyond him, given how many attributes there are to consider with every combination, it got me thinking.

Quite a bit. 

After all I think the man is genius. 

There were other signs that this change was coming:

Last week when I extended my gardens to beside our new fence, I combined yellow Heliopsis with an underlay of purple Lamium.

 While these purple Liatris were originally moved from the Monet Garden because of lack of sun, I could not be more happy with the improvement they have made to the Sun Garden - and I will be moving the scraggly Sea Holly there to join them! 

My gardens will probably always carry their colour-coded heritage with them, but a world of possibility has just been opened and I am certain that the inclusion of more variety will only improve them.

Come back next year and see for yourself! 

***
Sharing with Green Thumb Thursday, Today's Flowers, Floral Friday Flowers, 
Garden Blogger's Bloom Day

PLANT SALE REVIEWS

In the past couple of weeks I have been to two plants sales. Nothing against large suppliers (they can have great prices on common plants and one-year guarantees from Lowe's and Home Hardware are great), but there is something I like about supporting local horticultural groups.

The Friend's of Garden's Manitoba annual Mother's Day sale was last weekend. I had such success at the fall sale that I was very eager for this one but it was not nearly the same success for me.

My best deals were the three large white Bleeding Hearts for $10 each that my brother and sister in-law got us to commemorate the passing of one of our dogs the other week.  A great idea. 

I will not dwell on Gus' passing here but  if you would like to read an obit my husband wrote for him you can do so here. Be warned you may want tissues near.

Other purchases at the Friends' sale include:

- 1 sedum for the Alpine Garden ($6)

- White Monkshood for the Moon Garden ($6)

- 3 delightful Orange Iris for the South Lasagna Garden (SLG) ($6/each)

- 2 Honeyberry bushes to add some structure to the SLG ($14/each)

- 2 Maltese Cross ($3/each) which I believe are red for the SLG

- Sea Holly ($3) adding to the blues in the Front Lasagna garden (FLG)

I found their fall sale to be better last year because there were many more divisions from members and racks and racks of plants started from seed for the sale, both leading to rock bottom prices when I was looking to buy a lot of plants. 

The City of Winnipeg Living Prairie Museum native plant sale was held this weekend and I was there straightaway after work on Friday to get my hands on some native flowers. Prices were good at $3/plant compared to the $6 price tag for most perennials at the Friends' Mother's Day sale.

Their plants were grown in a greenhouse, so like the seeds I have started indoors they will require a period of hardening off before planting.
Native Wildflowers I bought in support of this important living museum include:
- 3 wild columbine (Aquilegia canadensis), red and yellow for the south lasagna garden
- 3 blue columbine, (likely Colorado Columbine but we will have to wait and see), for the FLG
- 5 New England Asters (Aster novae-angliae) for the FLG
- 3 Harebell (Campanula rotundifolia) also for the FLG
- 1 packet of Ground Plum seeds for the Alpine Garden 
- 1 packet Blue Eyed Grass (actually an Iris) for the FLG, to be sown in the fall 

And the winner is...

Both sales were well run and the people very friendly. Friends of Garden's Manitoba was much larger with much more variety including annuals, shrubs and even some veggies, but with my goal of creating a certified butterfly wayside the native plants and their prices make the Living Prairie Museum sale the winner. 
At least for this year. 

And the great news is that the sale continues on Sundays through June, so what  are you waiting for? get off your tush and buy some native plants!

***
Sharing with Wildflower Wednesday