Highlights from the Summer Garden & A Big-Time Surprise Visitor

Published on September 11, 2023September 11, 2023 by In The Vintage Kitchen2 Comments

A visit from the deer we call Juna in June.

Before summer ends officially on September 23rd, I didn’t want the season to go by without a garden update on how the seedlings fared once they left the greenhouse in spring. Given the late date, this is sort of like a summer wrap-up post told mostly in images – a view of our New England garden from June to mid-September. Don’t miss the real garden surprise (visitor) all the way at the end!

Heirloom Flower: The Watchman Hollyhock grown from seed started last year.

The Watchman Hollyhock starts out with a bloom as black as night but slowly turns a deep purple the longer it says on the stalk.

From black to eggplant to deep plums and bright purples – the hollyhock came to symbolize the enture garden as it grew and changed over the summer months.

Brussels Sprouts with a companion planting of dill and volunteer tomatoes – stowaways from last year’s crop.

OUR 2023 BEST GROWERS

This year, we were most successful in growing the following list from seed. Everything here but the pole beans, zucchini, and peas were started in the greenhouse in winter or early spring. The rest were started from seeds sown directly in the raised beds. Further down in the post, you’ll find the list of flowers and vegetables that we struggled with along with the various reasons. Hopefully, other New England gardeners will be able to share their insights as to why or what may have caused the challenges. But for now, here is our list of winners this year…

Tomatoes (Brandywine, Sungold Cherry, Sweetie Pole Cherry and Pineapple)
Cucumbers (Marketmore)
Collard Greens (Georgia Southern)
Hot Peppers: Lemon Jalapenos, Santaka Chile, and Padron Peppers
Rapini
Pole Beans (Blue Lake)
Flowers: Foxglove, Snapdragons, Hollyhocks, Mexican Sunflowers, French Marigolds, Zinnia, Geraniums
Mint
Lettuce (Rouge D’Hiver, Farmers Market Blend, Arugula, Salad Bowl Blend)
Cascadia Peas
Mexican Sunflowers
Jarrahdale Pumpkins
Black Beauty Zucchini (partially successful, more on that further on in the post).
Cucamelons

The cucamelons were one of our most enthusiastic growers this year. If you are unfamiliar with these little charmers, they are native to Mexico and look like miniature watermelons but taste like lemony cucumbers.

Our cucamelon plant literally vined its way to double in size in less than a month. At mid-September, it’s now over 9′ feet tall and still climbing. Its current destination is the upper echelons of the crab apple tree above it.

Cucamelon on the vine. They dangle like plump pearl earrings when they are ready to be picked.

Cucamelons are tiny (about 1 inch in length) but full of fresh summer flavor.

We loved the cucamelons so much that they inspired a new 1750 House summer cocktail – the Cucamelon Gin and Tonic.

So much new information has been learned about how to proceed this fall. What worked, what didn’t, what we can improve on and what we can forget, what we can nurture now and what we can save for another day or another year. A lot of surprises ensued. What worked great last year didn’t necessarily work as well this year. One thing that drastically improved though was the soil (thanks to a year of composting and leaf mold, and we didn’t overwater thanks to the miracle moisture meter reader. The garden was definitely much more lush and vibrant and full this year.

One of the surprises of the season were the Black-Eyed Susan vines. We almost gave up on these guys completely since they grew so slowly for so long. We figured they weren’t happy in the bed or the inground mound where we planted them. It took five months from seed to first flower (and our forgetting about them), but once they got to the bloom stage they really took off and haven’t stopped since. Now they are happily climbing all over the sides of the rock-walled raised beds and are producing lots of pretty little flowers. I learned from our local nursery, that they have the best luck propagating these flowers from clippings, so we are going to try that method this fall.

Tomatoes and pole beans climbing their way to the sky. This top rung of the trellis is 9″feet tall. We have to get on a ladder to pick the top tier!

The moonflower vines were a placeholder and an experiment to see if we liked a living wall on one part of the back of 1750 House. As it turns out we do! Next year, that wall will be covered in English ivy, which has already been planted at the base of the moonflowers. The moonflower seedlings were purchased from our local nursery, but we will definitely grow them again somewhere else in the garden next spring, this time from seed. They are fast growers and produce big beautiful white flowers, the size of your hand.

Our Biggest 2023 Garden Challenge: SLUGS

Oh the slugs. They slithered, they slimed, they feasted their way through the broccoli patch, the herb garden, the marigolds, the nasturtiums, the lettuce, the pepper plants (leaves only), the colleus and the cosmos. We tried all sorts of ways to deter them – sand barriers, chili powder sprinklings, tin foil, beer traps, nightly hand-picking.

We were most successful with the beer traps – sinking a small container in the garden soil filled with about 1/4 cup of beer. The beer attracts them to take a swim and then they depart this life in one big vat of boozy revelry. The other thing that worked well was handpicking (we relocated all the slugs to the woods each evening to carry on life there), but this was a never-ending task – every single one we picked was replaced with a new slug the next night. Plus, this hand-picking was a pretty unappealing and slimy exercise. Our buckets each night were filled with at least 30-40 slugs. Interestingly, they left all other plants in the garden alone, which is why we had such great success with everything else. Next year, we are going to try growing all of these feast-worthy plants in the greenhouse over the summer to hopefully keep them slug-proof.

Impromptu bouquet – snapdragons and phlox

First summer gathering basket: nasturtiums, zucchini, cucamelons, mint, Mandeville flowers, cherry tomatoes, pineapple tomatoes, Santaka chile peppers

Things That Didn’t Grow Well in the Garden This Year…

Zucchini (Black Beauty) – while they did grow big and lovely and flowered every day pretty much throughout the summer, two plants only produced three zucchini. Three was a definite improvement from last year’s crop which was zero, so we are moving in the right direction but this was also the second year they eventually became overcome by powdery mildew, even though we tried two different treatments: baking soda and neem oil
French Melons (powdery mildew victim #2)
All the herbs – parsley, basil, chives, sage, and thyme (The work of the mighty slugs! The only herb they left alone was the rosemary).
Cosmos – our second year in a row trying to grow these. (They produce a few flowers but then the plants dry up and die off)
Bush Beans – we rotated them to a different bed this year underneath the tomato plants and they did not like it. Maybe it was not enough sun for them once the tomatoes really started growing.
Broccoli (DiCiceo) – we harvested one broccoli head harvest before the slugs arrived for the season
Straw mulch – The intention was to use this as mulch to help with the slug situation but, as you can see from the list above, it had no effect and turned out to look really messy in the garden. Aesthetically it wasn’t our favorite.
Sunflowers – also our second year trying to grow these. Starting them in the greenhouse this year helped but they were weak and spindly and mostly fell over before July started.

Back to happier stories…

Our first big pineapple tomato weighing in at 1.7lbs

The big goal for 2023 was to create a pollinator-friendly garden. Success!

Pole beans and cucumbers joined the weekly gathering basket in August.

This year, the tomato’s best friend was the pole bean. Both still growing strong, they’ve become their own support system at the top tier keeping everything nice and tidy all on their own.

Impromptu bouquet: mint, Mandevilla, marigolds, Mexican sunflowers, snapdragons

The first time the gathering basket weighed over 4 lbs with all its produce was the first of September.

One nasturtium plant managed to outsmart the slugs. How? We aren’t exactly sure, but for some reason, they left this one alone.

All things considered, this year’s garden was definitely an improvement upon last year’s just as far as soil health, pollination count and bird and frog activity. Last year we had more voles and chipmunks but this year we had more slugs. Last year we had more heat but this year more humidity. Last year we had barely any flowers, and this year, we enjoyed ample bouquets all summer long. That’s the joy of gardening though I think. It’s always changing. Always engaging us.

Although the temperatures are still in the 80s, and there are still a couple weeks of summer left to go, Autumn is definitely beginning to cast her spell over the garden. Our first pumpkin just formed, the paradise apples are falling and our first sighting of a Spotted Orbweaver joined us overhead on the patio chandelier one night at dinner. Fall is coming.

The pumpkin vines are making “S” curves all over the sideyard.

Spiders, slugs, birds, bees, and Juna aren’t the only things that came to visit the garden this summer. Recently, we installed an outdoor trail camera to see what sort of wildlife came to visit in the night. Our most frequent sightings so far have been the wild rabbits (hop over to Instagram to see our favorite little bunnies zooming around the yard), along with the occasional raccoon, and opossum, two coyotes and a pine marten not to mention a bevy of early morning birds and squirrels. But our most dramatic guest so far is this guy…

A bobcat! He passed right through the yard with no incidents and thank goodness no bunnies. It’s pretty magical that such an extensive amount of wildlife lives while we sleep, carries on while we dream, travels about while we stay put for hours on end. We can’t wait to see what shows up this winter.

Last, but not least in this highlight of summer pos , we have two exciting sneak peeks of two very big 1750 House outdoor projects about to be unveiled soon…

We can’t wait to share them with you! Stay tuned!

In the meantime, cheers to summer 2023, to all we learned and all we reveled in, and to Lady Nature for continuing to be our biggest mentor and our guide. We’d love to hear how your gardening adventures fared this year. Please tell us all about it in the comments section. It’s so important to share the highs and lows, regardless of what part of the world we live in so that we can all learn together. The more gardening joy the better.

Here Comes the Sun(flowers): A Post From the Archives Resurfaces and Brings With It A Poem

Published on June 26, 2021June 26, 2021 by In The Vintage KitchenLeave a comment

Cheers to the official first days of summer! This week, here in the Vintage Kitchen we celebrated our own set of happy firsts too. The first volunteer sunflower of the season bloomed on the balcony just at the very same time that a sunflower re-bloomed on the blog. The balcony blossom was planted courtesy of Paul and Julia, our resident mourning doves.

The blog blossom was plucked by the editor of a Canadian poetry journal who discovered the Vintage Kitchen archives through a 2012 post about growing red sunflowers. That blast from the past featured this particular homegrown delight…

From the archives – a sunflower blog post from 2012.

Both sightings added unexpected sparkle to the week, but the blog blossom brought along an extra something special. It was selected to appear alongside a beautiful poem entitled Black SunFlower written by Redgina Jean-Paul. The two were published in the Juniper Poetry Journal on Tuesday…

Black SunFlower

by Redgina Jean-Paul

I am

going over
every single
little thing
every single—

And I wish I could
turn it off
stop the train
in its—

Track my thoughts,
pull them back,
nocked-arrow’s fletching,
set them—

Free to choose,
I wish…
I want it to
End. I do. I want

perfect pitch
black sun
flower bed
fellow man
made disaster.

— from Juniper Volume 5, Issue 1

With her remarkable way of illustrating longing and need, Redgina’s poem is quite a lovely collection of words. Even though there is always a sense of poetic movement and association when it comes to cooking in the Vintage Kitchen, it is not often that an actual poem comes home to roost among the pots and the pans and the foodstuffs collected on the counter. So it is with great pleasure that I have the opportunity to introduce a real-life poet who added beauty to the week with her turns of phrase.

To highlight the dramatic tone of Redgina’s poem, the editors of the poetry journal added a filter to the 2012 sunflower photograph so that when it was published in Juniper this week, the garden glory looked like this…

Side by side, picture with words, the two tell a little story…

If you are a long-time reader of the blog, you’ll have noticed that sunflowers pop up on a regular occasion around here. Idyllic companions in the kitchen garden, I love them especially for their sunny dispositions and their continuously cheerful color.

Cultivated by indigenous tribes in Arizona and New Mexico long before explorers ever set foot on North American soil, sunflowers have been brightening up our landscape for over four centuries. Not only are they a fantastic food source for bees, birds and people but they also offer lots of possibility for creative gardenscapes too.

A long-time love affair:) This was a garden photo taken in 2014.

Tall enough to offer shade to smaller plants, sturdy enough to act as borders for visual interest, and easy enough to grow in almost any type of soil, sunflowers are equally at home both in the city and the country. In our neighborhood, this city cottage grows them so tall every year they almost reach the roof…

And the birds help spread their seeds in empty city lots. Each summer, it is fun to walk around town and spot their handiwork…

The 20th century Rutgers University gardening professor, Victor Tiedjens believed that sunflowers were such a common sight and essential component in gardens, it was practically impossible to think of them as merely a decorative flower.

Every part of the plant contains additional uses. The stalks, thanks to their fibrous composition, can be used to make a wide variety of useful products like trellises, instruments and utensils. The flower heads can be sauteed or grilled with butter, olive oil, and garlic in their immature stage, where depending on preparation methods, can taste similar to artichokes or corn on the cob. And the seeds can be consumed in their natural state or processed for their oil.

Multi-clustering blooms of the Del Sol sunflower. The more the merrier!

When it comes to the red varieties, it wasn’t until I started doing my own gardening about 20 years ago, that I discovered the dynamic array of shades of the red sunflower varieties. Ranging from rust to almost-black, I became so smitten with them in 2012, that I ordered seed packages of all the red varieties that I could find online and then planted them all over the garden. Two months later a few hundred bloomed! These are some of the photos from that magical summer…

That was back when I lived in another state on a lovely rural farm with cows for neighbors and my favorite camera always in hand. After some time spent in this country setting, we moved to the city and sadly, my camera died an untimely death a couple of years later. Our last big photo adventure together was a trip to Seattle where I was trying to track down my great-grandmother’s doughnut shop (read about that adventure here). But I am happy to still have the sunflower photos and the memories of those colorful patches of red faces dancing on the breeze. They added quite a bit of drama to the garden in 2012, and it’s nice to see that they are now adding a little drama to the field of poetry too.

If you have some extra time this weekend, pop over to Juniper and get lost in some modern poetry. You might just discover some new favorites of your own. And if you like Redgina’s poem as much as we did, please share it with your friends and family. The poets at Juniper do not get paid for their work when it is published, so their efforts are a true labor of love and self-expression. Around here, we think the world definitely needs more poets. And sunflowers too for that matter.

If you are looking to grow your own sunflowers, I recommend seeds from Botanical Interests. They are not a sponsor of the blog or affiliated with the Vintage Kitchen in any way, other than being my most favorite seed company. That is a love affair that has been going for over 10 years now! Their seeds always have a great success rate, they offer many heirloom varieties and the packages are really pretty and informative too. Browse their sunflower collection here.

Cheers to Redgina and to Juniper, to Paul, and to Julia for planting seeds of joy and inspiration. And to the sunflowers who remind us to keep our faces pointed towards the light each and every day. Hope your weekend is a sunny one!

Everything’s Coming Up Dahlias!

Published on June 27, 2015June 26, 2015 by In The Vintage Kitchen4 Comments

Summer is in full swing here in the garden, dear readers! Since this is the first year living in the schoolhouse it has been exciting to see what new things pop up in the garden and, so far this summer has been no disappointment. Apart from the seedlings that Ms. Jeannie has planted she has been pleasantly surprised to see beds full of iris, roses, tulips and lilies, all in an array of different colors and varieties. The latest to present her pretty face…

the dahlia – of a most elegant height (almost 5’feet!) and a most robust disposition. Dahlias have been around since the 1600’s thanks to their “official” discovery in Mexico by these guys…

the Spanish Conquistadors, but it was the Aztec Indians who actually first utilized the flowers as a water source integrated within their hunting communities. Back then, the Aztecs knew the Tree Dahlia – a massive 20′ foot tall tree full of flowers (how pretty!)…

but as the flower slowly became introduced into Europe and then England over the next century, smaller more-plant like types were cultivated and world-wide familiarity bloomed alongside a diverse amount of varieties.

Lady Elizabeth Webster Holland is credited with introducing the dahlia to England in the early 1800's thus securing its survival in eastern Europe — Lady Elizabeth Webster Holland is credited with introducing the dahlia to England in the early 1800’s thus securing its survival in eastern Europe

In the 1950’s, the dahlia became a popular home garden flower and made its way center-stage to flower shows where it gained new found attention and supporters in the form of dahlia clubs all across the United States. Marian Walker, a novelist and avid gardener herself devoted an entire book to them in 1953, which Ms. Jeannie just listed in her shop…

Dahlias For Every Garden by Marian C. Walker - $8.00 — Dahlias For Every Garden by Marian C. Walker – $8.00

Full of mid-century gardening advice on how to care, cultivate and enjoy these flashy flowers as well as the story of their natural history and evolution, it also contains information on how to professionally show them, dissecting what makes a prize-winner vs. what just makes a pretty garden. A special photograph section in both color and black and white emphasis the dramatic differences between the 20 individual types within the species …

Thanks to avid enthusiasts there are now over 50,000 registered individual dahlia varieties throughout the world today. Imagine that, dear readers! It’s no wonder though really, with their cone shaped petals, flashy colors, and multi-stemmed flowers they produce some of the more dramatic statements in the garden landscape. And with their ability to reflect light in all sorts of dramatic ways, they make for especially stunning bouquets. Even after they are passed their prime, and have technically expired, some varieties like this all-white version from Ms. Jeannie’s garden, still looks pretty as it dries to a crinkly brown…

In a nod to bringing the outdoors in and to incorporating these pretty flowers into living spaces year-round, Ms. Jeannie is now offering dahlia flower wreaths made out of vintage book papers in her shop…

paperdahlia1 — Handmade Vintage Paper Wreath – $38.00

Just like the real flowers, these paper versions take on different personalities depending on the changing light within a room from morning to night…

Above are photographs of the same wreath taken at different times throughout the day! Because this wreath itself is made out of three different shades of aged paper from three different books – all romance themed fiction novels that date to the 1930’s and 1940’s – it takes on an ombre style color pattern graduating from light to dark. And at 23″ inches in diameter, it makes for an eye-catching wall display that’s ever-changing throughout the day.

Carrying themes of love, adventure, mystery and drama within each book page, these nature-inspired beauties not only make for dramatic wall decor, but also for fun gifts or decorations for weddings, showers and parties. Since no two are alike they appeal to Ms. Jeannie’s sense of decorating outside of the ordinary!

Whether you are planting them in your garden, collecting them in your bookshelf or hanging them on your wall, dahlias (in all shapes, sizes and forms!) can add a bit of pretty personality to your life.

Cheers to their strength, adaptability and individuality!

Stayed tuned to Ms. Jeannie’s shop for new dahlia wreath additions each week!

Lady Nature and the Summer Magic

Published on June 11, 2014June 12, 2014 by In The Vintage Kitchen4 Comments

Dear readers! This morning Ms. Jeannie went grocery shopping in her backyard for the very first time! In just two months, with the help of her greenhouse and a certain sensational lady, Ms. Jeannie’s garden project went from this…

to this…

Isn’t lady nature just marvelous?! With time being so scarce for Ms. Jeannie these past few months, lady nature truly proved to be the greatest of friends. “Don’t worry about your garden Ms. Jeannie – I’ll take care of it!”

And take care, she did! Boy that lady – there’s no stopping her abilities!

Today, the garden was offering a sale on cucumbers…

Ms. Jeannie picked six today, and as you can see there are what seems like a million in all stages still growing growing, growing. Ms. Jeannie could actually hear the cucumber plant say thank you as she plucked the ripe ones. Baby cucumbers moved right into the empty spots. Productive little creatures:)

The cantaloupe melons are in a race with the cucumbers. Who can outgrow their metal frames first?

Everyone is hedging their bets in the garden. The beets are betting on the melons.

The okra is betting on the cucumbers.

And the peas…

well, they are just betting on themselves and their ability to outwit the mammoth sunflowers. They’ve already outgrown their trellis and moved on to the sunflower stalks – so really at this point – the sky is the limit for them! Take that, cucumber melon competition!

Do you remember Ms. Jeannie’s grand plan for her re-purposed gift from the ground? A home for zinnias, ha! Four weeks into that growing project … they looked like gawky teenagers in ill-fitting clothing…

They immediately were sent to summer camp in the herb garden where they could spread out and be as wild and wooly as they wanted…

This suits them just fine!

Speaking of herbs, Ms. Jeannie just recently gave her chives a major haircut for a simple new recipe, which solved two problems at once – what to make for dinner and how to keep these fast growing onions from taking over! She’ll share that culinary feat in her next post – so stay tuned.

In the meantime, Boyo sends his best from the porch…

As you can see he is working just as hard as the ladies:)

A Birthday Bouquet!

Published on June 20, 2012October 4, 2012 by In The Vintage Kitchen3 Comments

Oh my dears, Ms. Jeannie was giddy all weekend in anticipation of this very blog post! She is happy to announce that on Saturday morning, her birthday, she was able to walk out into her garden and clip her very own birthday bouquet. Just as she had hoped for all those cool, dreary months ago, when she was planting seeds in the soil and dreaming of a lush summer garden.

sunflowers_redsm — The first bouquet of the season! Moulin Rouge and Drop Dead Red varieties.

Since Saturday, flowers have been opening up, by what seems like, the minute. Every time Ms. Jeannie steps out she sees something new in bloom! If you recall Ms. Jeannie planted a bevy of sunflowers, in a range of colors. Here’s what blooming today…

sunflower_yellowmix — A multitude of sunflowers! Clockwise (left to right): Autumn Beauty, Girasol and Del Sol Hybrid.

bouquet3 — Moulin Rouge Sunflower – not quite sure what those whitish splatters are!

bouquet7 — Del Sol Sunflowers. They all contain clusters of blooms! The more the merrier Ms. Jeannie says!

These particular Gold Honey Bear sunflowers (below) definitely remind Ms. Jeannie of the Vincent Van Gogh paintings she blogged about in March…

And what’s fun about the Moulin Rouge variety…

is that some of the backsides of them are just as interesting as the front! Some contain stripes of golden yellow on the backsides…

while others are as black in color as a flower can possibly be. Darker then espresso, even. Ms. Jeannie took these photographs so you could see the color difference yourself…

bouquet_compare — From black to red – sunflowers are quite diverse!

And a close up of the black one. It’s very striking!

sunflower_black_sq — Drop Dead Red Variety

These two on the vine are forming a lover’s knot!

bouquet13 — Sunflowers are peeking out everywhere!

bouquet12 — And they wave happy in the wind!

Ms. Jeannie even has a fellow appreciator of the garden, who as recently taken up residence above the Mexican Sunflowers (those flower pictures coming soon).

Here, he is perched on a bird feeder up above the vegetable garden. Ms. Jeannie saw him pull a fat tomato horn worm off her tomato plant the other day. Thank you Mr. Mockingbird:)

It’s so rewarding to be a grower;)

Fruits & Flowers – Garden Update: Day 68

Published on June 6, 2012October 4, 2012 by In The Vintage Kitchen2 Comments

Here it is, my dears, just over 2 months from original plant date and we some fruit from all of our labor!

The jalapenos are almost ready for picking!

The cherry tomatoes were a surprise! The seedlings were given to Ms. Jeannie as a gift by a farmer at the farmers market, who had under-estimated his seedling growing abilities. Ms. Jeannie, at the time, didn’t think to ask him what kinds of tomato plants they were, assuming, most likely, they were some sort of traditional red summer tomato. But to her surprise, one plant turned out to be yellow cherry tomatoes! Always such a pretty choice in summer dishes! The other plant is growing much bigger tomatoes so we’ll just have to wait and see what those develop into! Since she was so forunate with the yellows – Ms. Jeannie is secretly hoping the others are a purple heirloom variety!

Bell peppers are growing bigger every day! Ms. Jeannie is holding out for red ones so she has to fight the urge to pick them early!

And a red sunflower nestled between stalks and leaves just opened up yesterday. He’s in a tricky little spot so it’s hard to get a good picture. Perhaps he’s a little shy!

Coming soon: English peas, Mexican sunflowers, snow peas, sweet potatoes, mystery tomatoes and many many many more sunflowers:)

The Start of the Sunflowers

Published on March 31, 2012October 4, 2012 by In The Vintage Kitchen5 Comments

Today Ms. Jeannie started planting her summer garden.

It’s been a very mild winter this year in the South, so she could have started much earlier, but every once in a while, a folklorish sounding thing called blackberry winter hits our region, which sort of fools you into thinking that spring has sprung. But then a wicked Mr. Frost comes calling, and knocks out all the early garden preparations. Usually this happens around Eastertime, if it occurs at all, but this year Ms. Jeannie is throwing caution to the wind and planting early. Hopefully it will all work out.

Ms. Jeannie likes to order seeds from her favorite company, Botantical Interests. They have a lot of heirloom varieties, organic mixtures and seeds that always sprout. Plus they have marvelous looking seed packets that contain all sorts of fun growing information. They contain drawings of what the seedlings should look like too, which is helpful if you have a weed prone garden or aren’t quite sure what is what!

This year Ms. Jeannie is keeping things simple by just planting sunflowers and herbs. She will leave her vegetable growing to the local farmers and just shop for them at market each week.

Ms. Jeannie always likes to be a little out of the ordinary, so she has ordered 4 different varieties of red sunflowers, two fuzzy yellow sunflowers and one white sunflower. Ms. Jeannie finds red sunflowers to be most elegant in a bouquet and since many people aren’t familiar with them, she enjoys a bit of the surprise element!

Urn style planters serve as great vases for sunflowers. Their tall yet curvaceous lines balance the bold roundness of the sunflower face. Urns are usually heavier too, which is good, because some mammoth varieties can reach heights up to 9′ feet tall!

The botanical name for sunflower is Helianthus, which comes from the Greek word “helios” which means “sun” and “anthos” which means “flower.” Although native to North America, sunflowers were first discovered by European explorers in South America, but Native American tribes had been growing, cultivating and defining them from the beginning. Native American tribes used the flower petals for dye, the seeds for food, the oil for ceremonial body painting and the stalks for fiber.

Explorers brought seeds back to their native countries, so that by the late 1500’s sunflowers were a common site throughout Europe.

bordeux — Sunflower Field – Bordeaux, France. Photo by robsound

By the 18th century though that Europeans began cooking with sunflower oil. If you have never cooked with sunflower oil, it is supposed to contain the highest levels of Vitamin E, of all the cooking oils. It is light in taste and color. and is low in saturated fat. Learn more here.

Sunflowers can even be used as birdfeeders! Thanks again crafty Martha for supplying us with this pretty feeder idea:

To make your own birdfeeder like this one click here.

Because of their warm, cheerful coloring and their dramatic size and shape, sunflowers have been a subject for artistic study for centuries. Probably, the most recognized paintings of sunflowers would be those of Vincent Van Gogh:

While Ms. Jeannie does love all these paintings, she does wish that Van Gogh had painted more red sunflowers! As a gift recently, she did receive the new Vincent Van Gogh biography by Steven Naifeh and Gregory Smith…

…perhaps she will learn more about the inspiration behind all those sunflower portraits! Maybe he’ll even address the red ones! If anyone has already read this book, please let Ms. Jeannie know what you thought of it. She always enjoys a good book review.

On Etsy, there is a glorious amount of sunflower-related items, but red sunflower items are a little more niche. Ms. Jeannie was happy to come across these items: