I love hot colors in the summer and this year I planted a few.  The purple passion flower is stunning, a brilliant climber that surprises you with its blooms.  The Echinacea or Hybrid cone flower is such a beautiful melon color I had to add it to the garden.  Foxgloves are one of my favorite flowers, so were my gorgeous large hot pink Digitalis, but they don’t last in the summer heat.  So I added a new variety that blooms all season and has a hint of yellow with the hotter pink.  In the back there is also purple salvia and I planted a few annual star flowers to the mix.  Every year I continue to find a few more plants that make me smile.

How wonderful to enjoy a summer window box of simple and sweet flowers that just keep getting better as the season progresses.  In this box I used white geraniums, Wedgewood Angelonia, a variegated potato vine, mini petunias, star flowers, and Alyssum.

Shade containers never get boring.  Here is the front of a house I did using a large supported Fuchsia bush as the center and surrounding it with coleus, begonias, ivy, and more fuchsia.  It has a great deal of color for a shade container and will last well into the fall.

This is a shade container set back in a secret garden and I decided to use these amazing begonia leaves, with caladeums to sneak in a bit of color.  A very simple container making a big statement.  I really love shade plants!