Sweet Peas are another one of my favorite flowers! I love the gorgeous old-fashioned vines with their frilly, butterfly-like blooms. They just look like they should be planted at a cottage or grandma’s house, but they will also add a nostalgic charm to your yard.

Sweet peas come in almost every color, except true yellow. Most of mine are white and pink, but they do come in red to lavender to blues, some are streaked and flecked. Butterflies and bees are attracted to them.

Sweet Peas should be planted in full sun in garden soil that is rich in organic matter. Vines thrive best on a trellis that the tendrils can wrap around as they climb. Some will trail six to nine feet, but there are shorter varieties that are only eight to 20 inches tall. I think I need to get a taller trellis next year!

Sweet Peas are need to be fertilized throughout the growing season. Deadheading encourages a longer season of blooms.

In the past, I have had trouble getting the Sweet Peas to grow from seed in our garden. Then I read that Sweet Peas needed to be planted in cool weather. They require about 50 days of temperatures 60 degrees to bloom well. I planted them in early spring this year and they are just now blooming. I also cheated and bought some plants at the local greenhouse and they started blooming a couple of weeks before the seeds that I planted.

You can start them indoors, but I just planted the seed directly in the garden. Before planting soak the seeds in lukewarm water for 1-3 hours, then plant immediately one to two inches deep. Some resources say that it helps to make a small nick in the seed with a knife or metal file, to allow the seed to absorb the water more easily. To encourage reseeding, let some of the seed pods develop to self-seed. (I picked a few perennial geraniums to place on top of the trellis to add a pop of purple color.)

The Sweet Peas are great cutting flowers! Make a fragrant, romantic bouquet with your Sweet Peas. The blossoms usually last about 5-7 days in a vase. Harvest the Sweet Peas when fully open, they will not continue to open after cutting. A bouquet of Sweet Peas fills the room with their fragrance.

Enjoy this old-fashioned fragrant flower!

Resources:

Vegetables Love Flowers and Cool Flowers by Lisa Mason Ziegler

You can enjoy flowers from your garden all year! You can press your flowers and then get creative and use them in projects like greeting cards, bookmarks, scrapbooks, framed prints, or candles.

Traditionally, to press flowers you placed them in heavy books and then you had to wait weeks or months for the flowers to dry out. Now you can press them in the microwave in a matter of minutes and have much more vibrant colors than the traditional method. You can pick your flowers, press and dry them and use them in a project on the same day!

I have tried several microwave methods, but the one I like the best is using the Microfleur microwave flower press. It is available from Amazon in 5″ or 9″. I have the 9″, I think the 5″ would really limit what you could do and it would take much longer to press multiple flowers.

https://www.amazon.com/Microfleur-Microwave-Max-Flower-Press/dp/B0050GWV9C

You can experiment with the flowers in your garden, some press much better than others. Drift roses and blanket flowers are my favorites. Both retain their color well. Snapdragons look creative, but they do loose some color in the microwave pressing process.

I have not had good luck with large blooms – like regular size roses, delicate flowers like begonias, or flowers with large centers like coneflowers.

After the flowers are picked, you will usually remove the stem, getting the back as flat as possible.

This kit comes with 2 platens and clips, along with pads and fabric sheets. Place one of the pads on top of a platen with the ribbed side down. Then put one of the sheets on top of the pad. Lay the flowers upside down on the fabric sheet, making sure they sit as flat as possible and do not overlap one another.

Carefully place the second sheet on top of the flowers.

Cover the sheet with the remaining pad.

Place the platen on top of all of these, with the ribbed side out. Use the clips to hold all layers together. It is now ready to put in the microwave.

I have found that times vary with the types of flowers, and of course, with the wattage of your microwave. You will have to experiment with your flowers and your microwave. I usually start out with a minute, then check the flowers. Normally it takes an additional 30-60 seconds.

The flowers should feel similar to tissue paper and feel dry. When I think they are dry, I move them to a piece of copy paper and make a note of how long they were in the microwave, so I can use the same times for the next batch.

I have found that sometimes when you think the flowers are completely dry, the centers or thicker areas may still have a bit of moisture in them. So I cover the flowers with a second sheet of paper.

Then I place them under a couple of heavy books for a day or two. If you want to use them immediately, just double check that all parts of the flower are dry.

Experiment with buds, leaves and stems.

Try a variety of flowers, remember the drying time will vary due to size, moisture content, and the wattage of the microwave being used.

Fall leaves and flower petals can also be used. Complete and more detailed instructions come in a booklet with the Microfeur press. More ideas coming!

Be creative and have fun!

This has been a great year for roses! Maybe they liked the cool rainy spring that we had. Our roses have more blooms and look better than they ever have! The Double Delight rose is so beautiful! The eye-catching colors and fantastic fragrance make it immensely popular.

According to Wikipedia, ‘Double Delight ‘ is a hybrid tea rose cultivar bred by Swim & Ellis and introduced in 1977. Its parents were two hybrid tea cultivars – the red and yellow ‘Granada’ (Lindquist, 1963) and the ivory ‘Garden Party’ (Swim, 1959).

As the bud opens up, the rose is mainly a creamy white with just the edges tipped in a dark pink.

Then the petals begin turning a dark pink, almost strawberry red color. Gorgeous two-tone rose.

The blooms are large and most bloom continuously from spring to autumn.

So many different looks from one rose.

So pretty! You may want to add this to your collection. Enjoy!