Containers -- Why I Have So Many

I get a lot of emails asking why I have so many containers.  Or where did I get the beautiful containers and why do I have so many?  I'll get to that, but first, let's follow my Sunday foray into the garden.  First up, a short visit to the patio garden:

Oh yes, that is the clematis blooming and it's gorgeous!  I'm afraid this is going to be the only bloom though:

The Siberian irises are blooming:

As is the lupine:

I bought this bag of red potatoes at Walmart last week and today I decided to plant some in the wooden box along the driveway.  The rest will go in the metal trashcans in the veggie garden (I'm hoping that SS2 will plant them one day this week while I'm at work):

Back to the containers.  I have so many spots where I can't plant in the ground because of tree roots or stumps.  I also think that the idea of starting a garden in our large space was daunting, but I could handle designing a container.  This is an easy one with golden oregano, chives and lavender that overwinter.  I just have to stick a basil in each year and it's done.  This year I threw in two purple basil seedlings (technically red basil, but you get the point):

I like growing perennials in containers.  They survive the winter just fine and I don't have to start over from scratch each year.  The grass, phlox, heuchera, and salvia come back each spring and here I've added some coleus and white petunias (not currently blooming):

I'm sticking to a green, white, and purple color scheme this year.  Coleus, variegated geranium (which blooms red, but I'll just clip off the buds), purple basil, large leaf Italian basil, white petunias, and a lovely lavender plant in the container in front:

A big phlox, now joined by a heuchera that I picked up cheap at the end of last season but never got around to potting up -- I'm glad it survived.  The big pot has purple sage, white petunia, creeping jenny, and a white & green coleus:

It took a few years, but the garlic chives are finally thriving.  I added a coleus and purple basil to the salvia in the big pot.  The other pot has a stunning geranium, white petunia, and large leaf Italian basil.  It may end up being my favorite this year:

I lost the Japanese maple in the frog pot so I replaced it with a coleus.  The sage is out of control and as soon as it finishes blooming I'm going to cut it back.  The pot on the right will hold a tomato plant.  A Lillian's Yellow again since it did so well here last year, but I'm not ready to plant the tomatoes quite yet:

In fact, you can see them all still sitting on the top rack on the shelves.  I'm not quite sure when I will get to it, maybe Memorial Day if I can still move.  You see Memorial Day weekend will be a work weekend for me so I really took it easy this weekend only working about 2 hours in the garden and not doing a whole lot:

I reached in to turn this decorative frog around in the pot and found this funky moth on the back:

I used the internet to identify it as a Walnut Sphinx moth:

It feels good to get out to the garden even if I'm not nearly done like I have been by this time in past years.  Where are you in your gardening this year -- ahead or behind?

Comments

[Mummer]

Congratulations - your purple hues are the most vivid I seen!
I apparently have a salsa container garden this Spring. Your garlic chives (remember the
seeds you gave me years ago), the ancestors of my Early Girl tomatoes (self-seeded from at least two generations), eighty onion sets (from Lowe's, and growing vigorously), plus a few Giant Marconi peppers, and one Green Bell (all of which are not doing well) are going into the mix. I have dried jalapenas from last season so they'll pop in there, too.
The reason I'm making salsa is this - I began my Master Gardeners' course yesterday (amazing the amount of information I don't know), so as part of the fun two of us each week will bring in lunch goodies. My contribution will be 'home-grown' veggie salsa plus corn bread from, of course, a really nice package mix.
You know why I'm a container gardener. And, more about Southwest Florida container gardening soon....

[Storage Sheds]

i really love the blooms you shared. I pretty shade indeed.

[Andrew @ Garden ideas]

I always think that Coleus is such an underrated colourful plant for borders and container gardening.
It was used extensively in the past.
Like the Blue Glazed pots.
I saw some old metal large paint containers used as planting pots recently, the gardener had wrapped them in old sacking (Hessian) and tied it on with Twine, it all looked very natural. Thought is was a good idea.