Surely I have shared my cutting garden fantasy with you before now? It goes along with the Georgian Rectory and cherubic offspring vision, where I do a lot of wafting about and someone else is responsible for the grunt work.
But realization has dawned that in order to get to the end goal, I am going to have to overcome a few barriers. Never mind the obvious financial hurdles - the one I've chosen to tackle is my feeling of guilt over snipping blooms and foliage in my own garden.
It was reading these words over at Saidos da Concha (who I gather everyone else has been loving for ages, but I am fairly new to)
"unlike proper gardeners who can't bear to cut flowers for fear of spoiling the garden, I just can't let them die outside"
And somehow that made perfect sense to me and off I went, snipping with gay abandon.
See, I can vandalize my own borders and be okay with it. But I did have a good laugh when I read this slightly shamefaced post on Tea for Joy about using the neighbours' overhanging roses as your personal cutting patch. Because I would find that a whole lot less painful!
Perhaps my future actually involves a walled garden of the penitentiary variety.
I love the look of your pretty vase of homegrown flowers. I also have a cutting garden fantasy, but right now we're just struggling to keep our poor grass alive in the awful heat here. Although, I do have one very prolific and huge hydrangea that keeps me pretty well supplied with flowers for most of the summer so guess I can't complain -- or shouldn't ;-).
Posted by: Firefly | 14 June 2010 at 14:35
Don't things flower more if you cut them? Or did I invent that?
Posted by: The Coffee Lady | 14 June 2010 at 16:51
Beautiful, beautiful arrangement and beautiful blogs. I hadn't come across either of them before. A x
Posted by: little pink room | 14 June 2010 at 17:16
Sweet peas flower more if you cut them Coffee Lady.
I love your arrangement Ali. I love the mint you've popped in there. I like to make little posies with herbs and flowers.
Posted by: Sue | 14 June 2010 at 17:55
Oh my, I cut the neighbour's overhang too, I try to make sure their car isn't there....
Your flowers look so lovely and if you left them out there who knows when the wind or rain might get up and ruin them. Take your pleasure when you can.
Posted by: Rebecca | 14 June 2010 at 18:06
See, that's why I grow them on my allotment. I have no hesitation about scything them down when they're not right outside the house. Our garden's so small that if I cut a vaseful of flowers it would take weeks to recover.
Posted by: dottycookie | 14 June 2010 at 19:31
that is a great quote! I've always wanted a cutting gardent, too.
Posted by: kirsten | 14 June 2010 at 19:34
I'd love a cutting garden too. We inherited a garden with numerous shrubs and lots of bedding plants. Of course, the bedding plants didn't last long and now, years later, it's a very green garden.
I still find the odd little bit to cut and this week have been enjoying some beautiful roses that I discovered flowering in a hidden corner. As I couldn't even see them unless I really tried I figured I may as well cut them and enjoy them indoors.
Every year I intend to invest in some beautiful herbaceous plants, to give me armfuls of flowers to cut, but I never quite get round to it as my selfish children keep doing silly things like growing out of their school shoes!
Maybe we should hit the seed catalogues and grow our own?
xxx
Posted by: Lesley | 14 June 2010 at 20:17
we need flowers we are still putting in the structure (new build) I will have sweet peas soon though
Posted by: TheMadHouse | 14 June 2010 at 21:15
What a fab way of looking at it :-) Gorgeous flowers.
Posted by: Scented Sweetpeas | 14 June 2010 at 21:28
Oh, how pretty! What a lovely collection. Lucky you to have them, inside or out!
Posted by: domestikate | 14 June 2010 at 21:30
I have a rose in my greenhouse, which was bought for me as a small gift basket (from M&S) last year. Once it had done it's thing I just couldn't bear to throw it away, so hid it away in the greenhouse over winter. It miraculously resurrected itself this year, despite needing to be desperately repotted, and has just flowered. I cut 5 pretty stems off and they are now in the house. It seemed a shame for them to wither away in the greenhouse and I thought they'd be better enjoyed in the house - and they are. Your little bunch looks lovely - keep cutting them, they like it, I promise.
Monda
x
Posted by: Monda | 14 June 2010 at 23:41
My best flowers are all in a bit of the garden I can't see from the lounge, so I do cut some of the peonies (which have taken nearly ten years to start flowering properly), and I do grow a big pot of pinks just for Juliet to have posies in her bedroom.
Posted by: Annabel | 15 June 2010 at 10:29
Gorgeous! You could give Sarah Raven a run for her money. G and I have decided we really must grow more flowers on the plot next year... K x
Posted by: kristina | 15 June 2010 at 11:59
I have a hard time cutting my own flowers too -- although it's getting easier with the family of rabbits that have joined us. I'd have to change your quote to "I just can't let them be eaten outside." Your flowers are beautiful!
Posted by: Thimbleanna | 15 June 2010 at 18:05
What a beautiful bouquet! I keep looking at my Climbing Arthur Bell roses and thinking to myself that I must pick one soon! Lucy x
Posted by: Lucy Locket-Pocket | 15 June 2010 at 18:25
when I cut (the few) flowers from my garden I always feel like I'm actually rescuing them from sure death by rugby/football ball/cricket/baseball bats etc.
Posted by: Monica | 15 June 2010 at 19:55
Hurrah! I'm so glad you've managed to cut those flowers... they look so lovely in that jug and I'm sure they brighten up your mornings! :)
Posted by: Concha | 15 June 2010 at 23:03
My garden needs as much colour as it can get, without my stealing any. I put a bunch of new plants in the other day and bloomin' snails came and ate the lot in one bloomin' day...
Posted by: UK lass in US | 16 June 2010 at 04:12
I want a Georgian Rectory too! With a flower arranging room. And a gardener.
(Actually, that sounds alarmingly Lady Chatterly which is NOT what I had in mind.)
Posted by: Alice C | 16 June 2010 at 06:59
Gorgeous, just love the whole arrangement and your blog. Carina x (www.carina-at-home.com)
Posted by: Carina | 16 June 2010 at 18:34
Beautiful! Cut away, my friend!!
Posted by: beki | 16 June 2010 at 20:35
my camellias are in bloom at the moment...but I hate bringing them in because they just don't last well in vases. And I hate cleaning up all those dried petals....do depending on the flower (another is the lily) they can die outside and leave all the mess with them. I've been cutting leaves and greenery of late.
But I get what you are saying...there is always more another time.
Posted by: Tiel | 18 June 2010 at 13:44
I do like that philosophy - here's to guilt-free snipping! I wish I had more flowers to cut but here it's all veggies. I've always wanted to grow some peonies - maybe I should make a little corner for some next year as your little homegrown jugful is lovely and I'd like one too!
Posted by: Julie | 18 June 2010 at 14:03
Is that a David Austin Rose? I've planted myself a cutting garden on our allotment and I still can't bring myself to cut the flowers. I worry about depriving the bugs of the nectar... it feels wrong because the flower will be dead then ... a million reasons - so I'm still just admiring them attached to the plants.
Posted by: Julia York | 19 June 2010 at 09:01
Why is it though, that everyone elses garden posies look better than the ones from your own garden? Or is it just that I have arranging problems?
It has been lovely reading your recent posts, Domesticali, you are a most succinct and eloquent postee. Thank you. A x
Posted by: MagicBean | 19 June 2010 at 19:56
I love cutting flower a little at a time, so my beds not so bare, however my kids (meaning well) don't hesitate. They've brought me bundles before only to look out and I have just stems left..LOL. Of course, I hope they don't see my eye widen as all my flowers outside are in my hands.
Posted by: Gina | 29 June 2010 at 13:24