At the end of fall last year, I decided to redo the planter boxes on the outside of my deck. They had a variety of sage and salvia as plantings within. The plants were old and not looking well, so I decided it was a chance to plant something new.

With some help, these plants were pulled, and headed for the green waste bin.  The old soil that had contained the “wonderful Oxalis” plant in them was taken out put into a large garbage bag and put into the household garbage can. So now the planter boxes were empty and sat that way until this spring.

So now with spring, sunshine, warmer weather and the occasional rain shower-they were ready for new soil and new plants.

Now the question. What to plant? My neighbors had their large fruitless mulberry pruned back and now I have more sun until about 2 in the afternoon.  Before this pruning, I didn't have much sun.

Off to the gardens centers and nurseries we went!  So many choices, so many new colors what to choose.  I wanted a different look than I had with the sage and salvias, and decided on a variety of plants to fill the boxes.

We planted:

Transplanted some Day Lilies

Dahlia bulbs, different size and colors

Dusty Miller –Jacobaea maritima

Armeria maritima- Sea Pink/Sea Thrift

Nemesia hybrid ‘Cranberry' has bold red flowers

Nemesia fruticans—‘Bluebird' small blue flowers

Bidens hybrid-Asteraceae family

Campfire fireburst ,- opens red turns to orange (best of all no deadheading needed)

Purvian Daffodil-Hymenocallis

Regal geranium- light purple (also known as Martha Washington geranium)

Pelargonium x domesticum

These plants plus a variety of mixed flower seeds were installed. Now we wait to see if I got the change and effect I wanted.