There are always new varieties of flowers being marketed, and the photos of some of the newest flowering plants are mouth-watering!
However, as I look at my garden, my eye invariably goes to a few plants that I have had for years that I feel I could not live without. I'm sure that you, too, have favorite plants with a timeless quality that the newbies lack.
The yellow winter aconites and white snowdrops each spring are precious because they are both faithful and first. Later in the spring, the perfume of my viburnum shrub ‘Carlesii' (Korean spicebush) speaks to me with olfactory memories of my mother's garden. And, the perfect purity of the double white peony is precious as are the clumps of darkest purple Siberian iris ‘Caesar's Brother'.
The smell of the soft-colored lilacs in bloom always tugs at the heart and lifts my spirits. How could I manage without my dogwood tree that gives not only spring blossoms but also wonderful colored fall foliage?
I'm always besotted by the faithful return of my cranesbill geraniums that creep in many of my perennial beds. Then there are the hydrangeas that I buy to excess-with the excuse that there are much worse addictions.
My last flower each year is the pink Korean daisy mum ‘Sheffield', which flowers late and generously in October.
