Wednesday, May 15, 2013

The Peonies Are Here

If it's early spring, and I've found a fragrant bouquet of sweet peas, I know in my heart that I have found my favorite flowers. However, when I was watering our flower pots in the front yard, I stooped to smell the pert, white carnations, and when I inhaled their floral spice, I declared these are my favorite flowers.
Last summer we planted zinnias, whose colors burst with vibrancy and heat, and they have me recall long ago summers, and the flowers my mother grew, and I feel such an affinity for those, my favorite flowers. Lilacs, pansies, petunias, dahlias, cosmos, poppies, plumeria, daffodils, wisteria, apple blossoms, roses, lupines... peonies. In any given moment, I always seem to know, with absolute certainty, my favorite. Do you have a favorite flower, too?

12 comments:

Miriam said...

It's not possible, there can't be any favourites - they're all so special!

judy in ky said...

I love peonies too. We always had them in our yard when I was growing up, and I have some in my back yard now. It would be difficult to choose a favorite. I love violets, for one. My grandmother had them in her yard. My mom replanted some to her yard, and gave me some to plant in my yard in Pennsylvania. I carried them home on the plane.

Alison said...

Lilacs--but partly out of nostalgia, for we had a great, 10-foot tall bush at my childhood home, and here they do not grow. I could possibly swoon for the great beauty and fragrance of a lovely white gardenia, though.

Rois said...

Boy,only one? The top one is Mock Orange,mine is just about to bloom,so fragrant and elegant.Lilac's are second for sure.
Some how I have green thumb for most things but Peonies so I envy anyone who can grow them.We had a hedge of them when I was a kid that I used to hide behind.

ArtyZen said...

All of them are my favourites too. I love flowers that are good to look at but for me, my favourite flower needs to smell good.
Axxx

Natalie, the Chickenblogger said...

That's the truth!

Natalie, the Chickenblogger said...

I wish we could grow peonies here.
I love that your violets are being carried
around, and treasured.

Rebecca said...

Beautiful x

Natalie, the Chickenblogger said...

How did I not list gardenias!?
They are my favorite!

Natalie, the Chickenblogger said...

It cannot be one, can it?
No peonies grow here, so I
wait for them to show up at
Trader Joe's. They are such a treat.

Natalie, the Chickenblogger said...

Oh, lovely fragrance... this starts a new list of favorites!

Jennifer said...

My favorites are definitely everything. There is not a flower that I don't love. Among my special to my heart is Queen Anne's Lace, because my mother loved it.