The last day of October

On the last day of October, the warmest Halloween since records began, and more importantly the end of the growing season, I am picking up where I left it exactly three weeks ago. Since then I had loads and loads of flowers: Cobae Scandens, sedum, cosmos, chrysanthemums, dahlia's, ageratum, roses and many more. As I may have mentioned before, we're doing a house extension which meant that in the last two weeks I spent most of my time painting and wallpapering, and it is by no means finished ... 

I did do some bunches of flowers though. It's just that I didn't get around to write about them. In between the painting I have also tried to sow some flowers for next year and I am pleased to say that a few of them, the sweet peas and the cornflowers in particular, have germinated and are doing well. 

So below a few pictures from the last few weeks as well as today's vase with cosmos, ageratum, Euphorbia oblongata and sunflowers. This year I spent a lot of time deadheading and it has paid off. The sunflowers have really responded well to this, to my surprise, and six plants have given me continuous flowers for three months! They have gotten smaller over time but are as charming as they have ever been. 

 Cosmos

 Cosmos, dahlia's from seeds (the pink/purple ones), Dahlia Karma Choc

Rose Queen of Sweden, Chrysantemums (Korean hybrid), Dianthus 'Green Trick', and white Snapdragons (Antirrhinums).

Whereas the sunflowers started off to be double or triple the size of the cosmos in August, they are now the same size and as cute as ever. 

A pretend bunch of flowers or not?

Some of my family members do think that although botanically some flowers are flowers, they aren't really. So when last week the beautiful Cobaea scandens received that judgement, it inspired me to this week's bunch. The accused are Dianthus barbatus 'Green Trick', Euphorbia oblongata and some Nigella damascena (Love-in-a-mist) and papaver somniferum seedheads (so basically spent flowers). I love the result and I think it's a bunch of great flowers with intriguing shapes and colour, but of course it may not convince the non-believers in my household! 

In addition to this bunch, I decided to do another one with Ageratum houstonianum 'Timeless Mixed', which I have sown for the first time this year.  It doesn't seem to be stopped by setting seeds here and there, so after the first flush of flowers it is producing an abundant second one. I combined it with some rosemary as foliage. 

Unfortunately blues are really difficult to photograph, and the pictures below make the blue ones look more cyan than they really are. In reality they are blue-purple, with some whites and pinks, as the one in the picture below.

In addition to the two bunches of flowers mentioned above, I also need to tell you about last week's. Last week was the first week that I didn't write a blog while I wasn't away. I did do a bunch of flowers on Monday and simply didn't manage to write it up as it is so crazily busy with the extension work among other things. So below are a few pictures of the vase that graced the bar in the last couple of days with some of my other Autumn favourites: sunflowers, Dahlia 'Karma Choc', Cosmos (bipinnatus 'Purity', I think) and the wonderful and much debated Cobaea scandens.