Picture the yellow stately mansion accented in white trim with its huge porch covering the length of the home with a matching balcony upstairs. One side of the downstairs porch has a long, white wooden swing hanging in the middle. The other side of the porch has a conversation area designed around a white wicker loveseat and two wicker rocking chairs with plant stands on the sides of the loveseat. A wicker coffee table completes the look. The top porch balcony overlooks a beautiful, tree lined street is lined with white rocker chairs interrupted only by small white wicker tables. Beautiful, yes? Naked? The answer is also yes. Without beautiful hanging baskets, this house appears half as charming.
Preparing the hanging baskets
When the meteorologists predict the last frost is over, pull out any hanging baskets you currently have and inspect them for wear and tear. If they are metal hanging baskets with a liner, the inside liner can be replaced at a dollar store for a minimal amount $2-$4. If this is your first experience with hanging baskets, sometimes it is best to purchase a hanging basket premade, it is tad more expensive but, you learn how to care for your already happily blooming flowers and have a basket to reuse the next year. If you want to save more cash, pick up some topsoil for $3, find a wire hanging basket for around $10-$20 depending whether they have an inside liner included. Fill your hanging basket a little over half full of the topsoil. Now, you are ready to pick flowers to plant in your hanging baskets.
Hanging Geraniums and Pansies
I have the best luck with hanging geraniums and pansies. One of the homes we lived in was not as stately as the home I described earlier, but it did have the nice big porch stretching across the length of the house. Each year I would request five hanging baskets of pink geraniums from our local garden center. The hanging geraniums always go fast so make sure to order early. Because our garden center had inexpensive white baskets that went well against our green wooden siding, I did not replant the geraniums in wire hanging baskets. The price for pre-planted hanging geraniums with white baskets was $15 each. The $75 a year was well worth it because they bloomed and lasted from April till late October with our warm Texas weather.
Pansies are another great choice for hanging baskets; they are easy for the novice gardener to care for and inexpensive. Pansies cost around $1.48 for six plants, since these do multiply, it is not necessary to fill the whole hanging basket. If you buy two packages of pansies, water and feed them regularly, panies will bloom all spring, summer, and fall. As with all annuals, pansies don’t usually last all year. If you place them in the garage or a sunroom, they can last. I have some white pansies from last year that survived in an outside pot, I didn’t water them or protect them from the elements and yet with our mild winter, they are blooming beautifully again this year.
Hanging baskets are beautiful and add lots of charm to your home. They can be an inexpensive way to add beauty to your home. Place the hanging geraniums or pansies in a place where they can get sun and also, some shade during parts of the day. Water them once or twice daily and feed them once a week with a mixture of water and plant food. Each day when you water, gently pluck out dead or dying pansies, if you planted hanging geraniums, gently pull off the dead vines. These hanging baskets will multiply and be a delight and beauty for you and your guests as you enjoy the warmer weather together.
Photo by Esther Millette of her yellow pansies in a hanging basket.
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