Why I Grow Flowers

"can we speak in flowers.
it will be easier for me to understand"
― Nayyirah Waheed, Salt

I've heard it said many times before, "I'd rather grow food than flowers." Yet Americans spend $26 billion annually on flowers and 80% of the flowers we purchase are imported, primarily from Colombia and Ecuador (source). Another dismal fact: 45% of flowers are discarded before ever entering a shop.

It simply doesn't make sense to me why we wouldn't grow our own flowers instead of importing them thousands of miles away and wasting so much in fossil fuel. Flowers are so easy to grow, they attract pollinators to our garden, and bring abundant beauty into our lives. I actually find the experience of seeing a flower go from bud to bloom in the garden sooo much more satisfying than buying already cut flowers wrapped in plastic.

One of the most enjoyable activity I do every morning and evening is to stroll into the garden, clippers in hand, and arrange my own bouquet of flowers. Our home is constantly filled with flowers and they bring joy to everyone who come visit us. Just this alone is reason enough for me to grow flowers.

Here are some of my favorite flowers that I grew this year, presented by season. Hopefully the photos will inspire you to grab some seeds (many of which will be available at our website: https://www.seedsofabundance.net/) and cultivate beauty in your garden. Flowers is food for the soul!

Spring Flowers

California Blue Bells: This brilliantly blue bell-shaped flower is aptly named California Blue Bell. I obtained the seeds from a seed swap and scattered them in a wooden planter box on our deck. They were among the first to bloom in spring and a wonderful joy to see coming out of winter.

Sweet Peas: I fell in love with sweet peas at Camp Joy Gardens, where we grew them in a long bed. They'd fill up an entire fence, towering over me, filling the air with a heavenly scent, their tendrils reaching for the sky. My seeds of course came from Camp Joy. I learned a nifty trick to get them to sprout: nick or file their hard coat and then soak them in water overnight before planting. I wouldn't recommend this for a beginner though as they need some planning such as sprouting in the fall/winter indoors for spring transplanting and trellising. They are also very ephemeral.

Calendula: Even if you don't care much for flowers, it's hard to resist growing calendula. It's a classic medicinal plant that's also edible and re-sows itself easily. And for those who do love flowers, calendula actually come in a very wide variety of forms and colors such as dark red tips, light buttery yellow, and double petals.

Pansies: Another easy win...toss the seeds on the ground or into a pot and soon you'll have a ton of these cute beauties popping up. They flower a loooong time from spring all the way through winter. We found them still flowering in frozen ground last winter until the snow was 3ft, then, they finally gave up the ghost. They also reseed easily so if you protect them from hard frost, they will come back again and again. Did I mention they're edible? I'm a diehard fan of pansies.

Summer Flowers

Agrostemma: Possibly my favorite early summer annual. Planted en masse, these flowers make a statement! Can you tell the butterflies love them? And so do bees.

Poppies: I think poppies top my list of the easiest flower to grow. I way overthinked it early this year and sowed the seeds indoor then painstakingly transplanted them outside (not an easy task because they germinate extremely well, thus thickly, and their roots are deep). Learn from my mistake - skip all that nonsense and just toss the seeds on the ground. It's that easy. That's actually what @sagescrub did with extra seeds we had and didn't even bother to water them and they still grew just as well! Poppies also reward you twice in one season: beautiful flowers and the coolest pods!

Alliums: I totally think onion and leek flowers are way underrated. They're gorgeous! But if onion-scented flowers ain't your thing, there's a lot of alliums out there. Lots. The variety is astounding as well as their forms and colors, and lack of scent. Many are perennial. I'll be branching out next spring into the allium world and pretty excited about all the options.

Larkspur: My friend called this the diminutive version of delphiniums (with condescension) and I changed her whole perspective of larkspur when I hung bunches of dried larkspur all over our kitchen. They're wonderful both as fresh and dried flowers...brightening the room with that beautiful happy blue color on dark winter days.

Cosmos: An oldie but a goodie. Cosmos are great because one seed turns into a very large bush with hundreds of brilliantly colored flowers. It's an easy way to fill your garden with color and give the bees something to buzz about.

Dahlias: I got bitten by the dahlia bug this year when a new friend, who happens to be a talented biodynamic flower farmer, gave me a bucket full of tubers to grow. They took some work because dahlias need lots of care and nutrients. I potted up the tubers (each one in individual half gallon pots) and watered them until they sprouted. We dug deep beds for them and added a shovel full of compost and a handful of crushed eggshells and bone meal into every planting hole. The efforts were well worth it because dahlias are the most spectacular blooms in the garden. I also discovered the tubers are edible. We ate one and we actually really like it so we're going to dig them up in the fall to store and eat.

Strawflowers: This everlasting flower is an essential part of our garden. It's easy to grow from seed, is hardy and heat tolerant, and produces prolific amount of flowers from early summer to fall. I harvest strawflowers in bud form and hang them to dry so that they will retain their shape and color for years. They're the main flower I use in making wreaths.

Well that just about covers most of the flowers growing in our garden :). Fall is approaching and there are a few flowers coming into bloom that I'll share another day!

Already I'm excitedly planning next year's garden as I look forward to extending the blooming season even more with fall planted bulbs. Stay tuned for more flower updates in future posts!