It’s nearly Valentine’s day, and the red roses thing that people do every year got me wondering: what’s your favorite kind of flower?
I am the kind of person who has always loved irises and would appreciate one of them more than eight dozen roses sent to my door.
How 'bout you?
(More of a ivy person meself actually.)
I’m partial to deep blood-red roses (none of them yellow or pink roses).
Other than roses? Pansies.
Flowers…ahhhh. I’m such a shameless push-over for flowers. It’s pitiful. Really.
But, like you, I don’t get as weak-kneed by the roses (which I do love and whole heartedly appreciate) as I do by other flowers. Snap dragons. Love them. African violets, irises, lilacs, they’re all nice too.
Oh sh*t. Who am I kidding? I love them all. But snap dragons are fairly rare in bouquets…
What about lupins? 
Gerber daises are my absolute favorite. They are bold and bright and they have the greatest colors, almost surreal.
Around the yard I love our daffodils, irises, and crocuses. The daffodils have been growing wild since the late 19th c. And I love it when the first crocus peeks up through the ice.
When giving flowers I try to give nice seasonal ones, I let the florist recommend. Roses also never fail.
Am trying orchids, and MrsM is a whiz with her African Violets. Oddly it is our Westerly window where they thrive the best. The two-part violet pots work well.
My rule of thumb is if it perishes within two months it doesn’t get replaced. Far from being green, my thumb is more plague blue, so I try to get hardy stock.
Me too! Specifically, Blue Flag irises. They’re a lovely delicate lavender color, with huge petals. My mother used to have them growing on either side of her front porch, and they bloomed a few weeks before my birthday in late May, so I would always go over there and cut myself a big birthday bouquet.
But then Dear Mother decided she wanted a rock garden, so she ripped out all the bulbs and THREW THEM AWAY!!! Never asked me if I wanted them. I haven’t been able to track down a source, either, so if anyone has one, please let me know!
That said, it was lovely last year when Mr. Scarlett brought home a dozen red roses on the 12th anniversary of the day we met – a rose for every year. He said it was the first time he ever gave anyone a dozen. Gotta love him!
“The calla lilies are in bloom again . . . Such a strange flower, suitable for any occasion. I carried them on my wedding day, and now I place them here in memory of something that has died.”
Oh, I’m sorry—where were we?
lilacs are my favorite. Mix them with daisies from a roadside ditch, and I’ll be happy for weeks.
I love lavender. My mom grows lavender in her garden and every summer I pick as many as she lets me and I just hang them up to dry. Love it. I want lavender when I get married. But I’m also quite fond of sunflowers and poppies.
Katharine Hepburn - Stage Door (1937)
Huh…oh…my favorite flower? Gardenias!
Scarlett
Blue Flag Iris, iris versicolor, can be ordered from Arrowhead Alpines, a rather large nursery here in Michigan that specializes in rare, hard-to-find, or woodland plants. They have a PDF catalog (86 pages) that you can download/view on line/print off. The flowers are listed by scientific name and the Blue Flags can be found on page 63 down near the bottom of the page.
I’ve been to the nursery before (they are pretty close to where I live) and it’s amazing the stuff they’ve got.
Here’s the link: http://www.arrowheadalpines.com
Oh, BTW, I tried to email you this but your profile is set up to not allow emails from the Board.
The price on the iris’ is $4.50/per. Price codes are up a ways, at the beginning of the flower section.
Enjoy!
I would absolutely have to say that my favorite kind of flower is the white and pink roses! I absolutely love them especially the white roses.
I’m not too big on cut flowers - the kids’ allergies go bonkers.
In the garden, my fave has long been columbine, but the anenome I planted a couple of years ago are now a close second.
The Asphodel, sacred to Persephone and associated with the fields of the dead.
The Tuberose, whose sickly-sweet perfume hangs like a gauzy curtain across the great novels of the late 19th century Decadent movement.
– Spooky Uke
And as far as roses go, I have a big red climber against a fence. It was growing by the back stoop in the house I gre up in. My mom said it was there when she met my dad (who had lived there since 1927). So it is at least 50 years old. My parents moved out of that house in 97, and I dug up a chunk of it. My p’s died in Jan and Feb 98. I really enjoy having that bush in my yard.
I love all shades of roses. I also like to dye them to get some neat colors. But I have to say my favorite are the many varieties of Orchids.
Since Valentines Day is comming, anybody want my address? I know a good florist you could call nearby that delivers
I do like roses of all colors. But a lot of the time, simple flowers are even prettier. Dasies, and those little puffy things that blow in the wind, and the weeds that grow in fields sometimes have more beauty than storebought stuff. Oh yeah, sunflowers too.
Foxglove and peonies and forget-me-nots and camelias and fairy roses and hydrangea blooms and daylillies and iris and lantana and calla lillies and bachelor buttons and phlox and magnolia blooms…
Flowers by Sandy: 901-276-4495. Just in case. You never know.
Another vote for Irises, the variety that are “German” as opposed to the japonica. Though I like those, too.
Tulips-- remind me of my Dutch grandma
Lilac-- remind me of the hundreds of blooms in our lilac hedge when I was growing up
Daylillies – I can’t help it, they’re just so triumphant and cheerful. Didn’t Robert E Lee once call them weeds, or the hallmark of a lazy man’s garden? I have some that are this amazing buttery canteloupe color–it’s all I can do to keep myself from eating them when they’re in bloom. And I don’t even like canteloupe!