Simple Surprises

I spent a few hours on Saturday planting seeds for flowers.  My methods are a little unconventional, so I want to explain a little.

One of my favourite parts of living in the the country has been having a little extra land.  When we first moved in I planted bulbs in our front garden and patiently waited for them to grow the following summer.  They never showed and I was sorely disappointed!  This year however, several of the bulbs I planted two years ago showed up.  I had assumed they had been eaten by chipmunks and had given up on them, yet, there they were.  They just needed to rest for a year before blooming.  What a nice surprise!

The first flower we saw this year was a pansy.  I blogged about it here on March 10th.  I never planted pansies (ever), yet they sprung up in several places in our flower beds this year.  What a simple but beautiful surprise!

I have found many simple and beautiful surprises in our gardens: fresh dill I never planted, chives growing the our ditch, forget-me-nots, lily of the valley (also in the ditch) and other lilies too.

Just this weekend I found these:

Alright, so back to my planting...

I took all the flower seeds we had on hand (annuals and perenials) and mixed them with dirt before spreading them in random places around the perimeter of our yard.  I grabbed the remains of some lupins with large seed pods and spread them around too.

We have taken to throwing all remains of flowers into the ditches bordering our property.  I bring whatever is blooming in the ditches or side yards into the house and put them in a vase for us to enjoy.  When they are done blooming, I throw them back into the ditch (in another location from where I found them) hoping they will reseed themselves for next year.  I love the idea of this and think that if we continue doing this for a few years we will be able to enjoy different flowers every week.  I have no idea what will end up growing, or really even, where it will grow, but that's half the fun of it!

I won't see the fruits of my labour this year, maybe not even next year, but when something surprising pops up, I won't have to wonder how it got there, I'll know I put it there!