Watson's in August
Visiting Watson's Greenhouse and Nursery is always a treat. On Saturday it became a refuge as well.
Rain splats hit the windshield as we drove from Starbucks in Puyallup out to the nursery. We had a choice of two destinations and we chose to go to the nursery with the most cover first because the sky was getting darker and darker.
As the rain held off we had time to check out some of the wonderful displays out in the open.
I've never grown a passion vine. Have you?
Watson's has a large selection of shrubs.
And then the rain hit. It poured.
But we were under here, where all of the glorious cone flowers were in bloom.
Giant hibiscus again. They were huge
We love the colorful foliage of heucheras.
Watson's knows how to display plants so that you want to buy the whole display.
It's pouring out there, and noisy under the roof.
Cool zebra grass.
And zebra striped cana.
Coleus
and ornamental peppers.
Wonderful sunbursts of rudbeckia
Subtle colors
We stepped inside the gift shop, saw this, and turned left to the house plant section.
Tillandsias are a thing these days. I have just one.
No orchids for me either. We tried one long ago but could never get it to re-bloom.
We browsed through all of the cool gift shop stuff.
And were back to here. I guess autumn is sort of around the corner. At least it's next as far as seasons and holidays go, but I'm not ready.
I think someone photo bombed this, if you check the mirror.
It was still raining, so we stayed for lunch. They have a great little cafe. I had clam chowder and a side salad. Tom had a shrimp salad. And then we had cake. ;-)
The colors of high summer - love them!
To show our appreciation for the fun and the food and the shelter, we bought this, a lovely little hardy fuchsia, called "Erecta", probably because its flowers look at you instead of hanging down.
Then since the rain was done, we moved on to our third destination for the day. I'll get to that later.
I sure wish we could have had a little bit more of that rain. It barely wet the sidewalk. Love the beautiful foliage you share here, Linda. :-)
ReplyDeleteWhat a wonderful nursery! Seems it is arranged by an artist with an eye for color, arrangement, and accessories.
ReplyDeleteWe have passion flower vines growing wild, covering my plumeria tree, almost seeming to crush whatever it climbs on. We have several varieties here. The flower has a beautiful perfumey fragrance, rather sexy! And the fruit is tart and rich. We call the plant/fruit "lilikoi" here in Hawaii. My friend Wandaful makes great jams, peppers, butter with the fruit, and it is heavenly on ice cream.
I've never seen a Passion Flower vine let alone grown one. It does look amazing though. As does the hardy fuchsia Erecta. I think I'll look for that one next Spring.
ReplyDeleteIt seems amazing to me that your nurseries have so many perennials still available. Around here things are slowing down a lot. Not a lot to choose from.
ReplyDeleteLoved all the red in the first part. That Hibiscus is enormous. We had them in Florida but never anything that size.
ReplyDeletewhat a fun colorful cool day...we now have sunflowers growing wild on the sides of the roads in utah-that's how we know august is here...
ReplyDeleteWow... what a great place to wander around!
ReplyDeleteYou got lucky being at Watsons with the heavy rain.. I wish we could get some rain.It's very dry here.
ReplyDeleteGood Grief, Halloween decor already! Well, I love a good witch figurine. I'll have to pop in soon and take a look. I'd like to try a passionflower vine.
ReplyDeleteWhat a pretty Fuchsia! I love the Coleus and begonias combinations in the outside planting...stunning together! :)
ReplyDeleteI have a passion flower vine and it likes to take over the back fence. Works for me because it fights off the damned ivy all over the place back there. They're well worth growing as the flowers are so interesting but even large vines are never covered with flowers like clematis. They only open a few at a time but they bloom over a long period of time. Isn't the sound of rain on the roof there cool? Was there a few days before your visit and shuddered as they were beginning to set up the Halloween displays. Like you, I love that time of year but am not quite ready.
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