Does anyone else do this?

At the end of the garden season, I mock up all the ideas I have for spring, and take 'staging' pix to aid my planning for the next year. (I started with staging pix when I converted the MudDorm to a rentable room.) I can usually take all my shots with just one flat and one potted plant, which I give to neighbors when I depart for PA.

I find it really motivating (especially due to not living in the Ohio house year round), to have an approximation of what I'll need to do/buy (and not overbuy).

Here's what I gave myself as eye candy this year so far:

The bold Dragon's Breath a neighbor recommended is still going strong in a granny cart garden, which is ALMOST too heavy to move (despite its styrofoam core and perlite in the soil). The petunias surrounding the dragon never quite recovered from the hired help's neglect during an early fall hot/dry spell, which also kilt the several trailing vinca I'd bought.

I did not have time in August to puncture the plastic liner to insert annuals into the cart's sides and front, but I hoped my plan would work.... I dreamed of that planted cart...

So, last week I splurged on one flat of clearance pansies, which do give some idea how this may look, when I arrive in May with annuals and herbs started from seed in PA. The plastic lining the cart is 2 layers of construction-weight plastic, and the soil is not leaking out from the pockets I slit into the plastic.


I'm also very pleased with the look of an old, enameled iron woodstove I mock-planted; in those pix I can see how much/what kind of plant material to prepare for horizontal grow-bags which will nestle into the open oven and warming section on top, with pots all across the top of the stove. Even on a cloudy day that white enamel pops!

~S~