Adding a Blooming Welcome with Garden Flowers to the Potting Shed Door

Happy August!

It’s the first Monday of the month which means I’m joining

my blogging friends for some Monday Morning Blooms.

You can find my friends’ links to the floral inspiration at the bottom of this post.

Our common theme for this week’s edition of Monday Morning Blooms

was creating a flower arrangement for a door.

I picked some garden blooms for a cheery welcome

to place on the door of the Potting Shed.

 Limelight Hydrangeas, along with some Abelia foliage,

fill a wicker basket to hang on the door.

This basket is one I’ve had for 20 years from my retail days.

It had gotten a little bleached from the sun over the years,

so I gave it a refresh with some brown craft paint, thinning it with water.

After the paint dried, I sprayed with it with an acrylic matte sealer

to give the finish some protection.

Limelight hydrangeas are a panicle hydrangea that are fast-growing and low maintenance!

They bloom mid-summer in our zone 7b garden,

when everything else is beginning to look tired and spent . . .

. . . like I do by August after lugging my hose around in 90+ degree temps. ;)

For more information on growing Limelight Hydrangeas,

see my Public Service Announcement:

Plant a Limelight Hydrangea…or Five.

To provide a liner to hold water for the flowers in the basket,

I used a Prime Solution and envelope trick  . . .

The white envelope was visible through the weave of the basket,

so I gave it a couple of coats of brown spray paint

to blend with the texture of the basket and disappear.

Note:  Always test your envelope first, I tested a couple that weren’t watertight.

You can double them up or add a dab of hot glue to the corners of the envelopes

which was where the leaks occurred. 

If you’ve been a follower of my blog for any length of time then you know

I love all things *bee* including seeing them buzz and bumble

around the garden!

I found this Floral Bee Embossed Post Box from Antique Farmhouse.

It’s no longer available but there’s one similar available from Amazon, HERE.

Metal import items are rarely watertight, but hope springs eternal

and I tested it with my fingers crossed. :)

When I saw it was leaking, I added another plastic envelope to the box.

I filled the box with some garden flowers. . .

Endless Summer Hydrangeas that have faded from their vibrant blues to softer greens.

They’re joining some zinnias, lantana and abelia foliage.

Bees are buzzing around the cleome. . .

And Mrs. Powers and the zinnias. . .

Did you know there are more than 4,000 native bee species in the U.S.

with over 500 species here in North Carolina?

They vary in size, shape, color and carry pollen in various places on their body

and even have different seasons of activity.

You can see the pollen basket on the female bumble bee in the above photo,

exclusive to female / worker bees.

Workers and queens have two pollen baskets,

one each on the outside surface of their hind legs.

The pollen basket when empty it is a large, flat shiny area with spiky hairs around the edge,

but appears yellow, orange or red, when filled with pollen.

Fun fact: Bumblebees visit more flowers per minute than other pollinators.

*Buzz* over and visit my talented blogging friends to see their floral inspiration this week:

 Lidy at FrenchGardenHouse

Pam at Everyday Living

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 Between Naps on the Porch