Unknown: Hello, and thanks for joining us for another edition of Mid American gardener.

I'm your host Tinisha Spain and we're joined in the studio by one of our favorite panelists Miss Ella Maxwell.

So hello, introduce yourself and tell everyone where they can find you in the garden.

Okay, I'm Ella Maxwell.

I'm from Central Illinois.

I'm a Tazwell County Master Gardener.

And I'm also a Illinois certified nursery professional.

I spent many years at hair nursery and now I'm working there part time.

I really know a lot about perennials and kind of trees and shrubs.

And I do have a large yard and have lots of hobbies.

So I can answer just about any question.

You probably remember Ella from our syrup making segment that we did.

Everybody loved that.

So that's, that's where you recognize her from.

And I'm, I'm going to do that this spring, I'm definitely going to get on board with that.

So today, Ella is going to talk to us about making some portrait arrangements in any indoor arrangements.

Sure, all kinds of stuff, just holiday seasonal arrangements to just make you happy kind of dress up the indoors and outdoors.

Porch pots, I think is what you call them.

Yeah, when we were emailing back and forth.

So take it away, what are we gonna make first?

Okay, well, I thought first that we could try making a floral arrangement.

So I'm going to have you help correct.

So the first thing is, is that this is a waste this right here, this is a green foam, you can buy it at the hobby supply stores, or a florist.

And it usually comes in a four by eight block.

And so I cut half a block.

And then I do have some tape.

And this is what a professional florist would do.

This just keeps it in the container.

And you can just use anything, a little bowl or whatever.

And actually, this is a recycled container from an arrangement that I received as a gift, there we go up.

So we've got the criss cross of this over the top, and you can see that we've taken a knife and kind of shaved the corners.

And the reason that we've done that is that when we're sticking in some kind of green, it's much easier to stick it into a flat surface than to try to stick it in on a corner.

Okay, okay, so it doesn't really matter, you need something that's going to have a reservoir and you can see that we have plenty of room to get our finger in to check the water level, and then also to be able to pour some water in.

And for this type of arrangement, I usually use a little hand watering can with the with the spout to get it right down in there.

Or sometimes you can set the whole arrangement into your sink and and water it from the bottom up.

So I've never made a live arrangement using one of these.

So this is awesome.

I'm excited.

Okay, well first.

So you have to think well, what kind of flowers am I going to use and this is going to work for whatever you want to do.

So a lot of times in the winter.

It's kind of Dreher and I've gone I buy flowers at the grocery store.

And I always look at discount flowers at the store.

So that's what I got for us today are some flowers that we're going to use here.

So you can buy an inexpensive bouquet for $6 or less.

This one right here is all strum area.

This is a very long lived cut flower and it's one that I like to buy because I know that a last at least another week or more are these is this in the lily family.

I believe that it is I know that there may be some varieties that are marginally Hardy for some of our southern viewers.

But this usually comes you know, six, six stamps or or so to a package and it comes with the the little packet of food and you can use that I would recommend that you do it also this Alstroemeria has foliage on its leaves and you want to strip those leaves off so that you can you want you don't want foliage in the water.

That's what makes your water kind of yucky.

And so what we're really going to do for our arrangement is I'm just going to use a pair of Felco pruners I like these because they they're a bypass scissors action and to make our arrangement We're just going to cut them all the same size.

And I'm going to say that right there it is, right?

I've got, I've got a box right under there that we can.

Compost.

Yeah, that's it, we're gonna nothing goes to waste with real garden right right in there.

The other thing that I bought, again, were these little Hypericum berries.

And the Hypericum berries here are really kind of festive.

And these you can actually grow.

Monrovia nursery has floral berry series, that's a a hybrid Hypericum that will have a yellow flower.

And then they can make these different colored fruits.

And I have a couple Hi, parrot comes, they do have some medicinal uses, and such.

But I thought these were kind of pretty.

There's one but these were flowers that hadn't bloomed yet.

No, no, it's their little berries.

And you can see that some of them are starting to turn a little brown.

But our guests aren't really going to notice that because we're going to have so much other things in there.

And again, we're going to just make it easy, we're just going to cut them, you want to hold that aside, we're just going to cut them.

And this is the length of our arrangement.

So once we have this, we can make an oblong, we can make it circular, depending on the height that you might want.

You can make it low a low bowl, however, but we do need to use some greens.

So would you bring in the Greens department?

Well, you can go outside.

And what's evergreen in your yard right now?

Box wood.

So we could use Box wood.

And again, I like to just strip off some of the leaves.

And we can just put this in down near the base.

So I have some box wood.

And we're gonna just go north, south, east west.

Okay.

Now, is this going to be a centerpiece?

Just Well, this can set?

Yeah, on your table, it could be on your mantel, we could just, you know, do it all on one side.

It could be in your entryway.

Wherever you you would want whatever you would want to do.

So are you able to reuse these?

Or is it just one shot and then you got to I reuse them.

But again, is this to do as I say not as I do.

Right?

We have a lot you're having a event where you really need the flowers to last for a super long time.

You wouldn't want to reuse it because the wicking action with this foam bringing the water up into the foam if there's too many holes.

Got it, it's not dry out, right, it's not going to stay as hydrated.

So we will put one up on top.

Another wonderful green that I really like here is white pine.

And the nice thing about White Pine as well as as the box word in the white pine dry.

They they lock their needles on so it's not like there's going to be a bunch of little needles falling around your arrangement.

So now we're going to just put some white pines in, add some texture, yes, between the boxwood.

So we're going, you know, we've still got our criss cross of white pine and we added one at the top so maybe we'll put in a few more.

This is not rocket science.

Here you go.

Okay, just add one.

I like I like it's coming together.

So other evergreens in our yard and you just went outside your house and just kind of found these and well I got the boxwoods actually these beautiful white pines that you see right here we had a windstorm and I do have a neighbor down the street who had a branch come down and I just was out for a walk and walked home with the branch from the from the curb.

But I do have a weeping spruce.

So you know if you want to use a few little evergreens, this is the one that when it does drop, the needles probably will when it dries, they could fall off.

So yeah, gosh, here we are.

We're just putting filling it in filling it in.

And the other thing is in January, when you want to make something for yourself, I mean you can go outside, shake the snow off, get some evergreens and I also have some evergreen perennials.

Okay, so, again, we want to make a whole arrangement With just greens, and what we're doing is creating this texture.

So do you recognize this one?

Oh, no, it's a quiz.

Well, that's a hellebore.

Hello.

I never would have said that.

So they have evergreen leaves.

And then in the spring, they look kind of poorly and you'll want to cut them off.

But let's just put in a couple of those evergreen leaves.

I'll put one on the backside here.

Sure.

No, that sounds good.

Yeah, there's no front or back.

They're just everywhere.

The other plant that I like a lot to use, is a ground cover.

This is Pakka.

Sandra packer, Sandra.

Yeah, it says a little ground cover and it's evergreen.

And we're just going to put a few of those in.

Okay.

Okay, so see what we're doing is we're just filling in to create, you know, covering the blog.

Yes, yes.

Another plant that I love is epimedium.

And these, this is another kind of ground cover spring bloomer.

And there are several varieties, one is evergreen, and the other is more her herbaceous or where it dies back, where it's brown, the foliage is brown, but this will stay green for quite some time.

And so if you really could just leave this green arrangement, then it's still nice.

Even if you didn't want to do a pop of color.

Or look at the Christmas holiday or whatever holiday you celebrate his past.

This still is very wintry, very.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah, with some snowflake rivets.

That would be lovely.

But we're not going to stop there.

There were and we haven't even gotten to flowers yet.

I have lots of houseplants.

And so I try to be a lot of IV and I have a lot of variegated IV.

So here's a real pretty green and white and here's kind of a yellow and green.

And so we're going to just have this coming out of the center.

You're really good.

Yeah, here's a plain green one.

There we go.

Oh, you're weeping fig.

Everybody's got a weeping fig will have a weeping fig.

And then of course, your firm's.

So here hair have a cripple firm, right?

This is going to just make it kind of, you know, these are going to stick out above and around and down to do the opposite.

You can use all kinds of houseplant foliage.

So this is a ginger.

And this could be in a mixed arrangement in a in a vise because it's it's taller.

And you're not really sacrificing that much.

So there's our beautiful arrangement so far.

Wow.

It's It wasn't hard.

No, no, not at all.

So now all we have to do is put in some flowers for some color.

So we will do this part because oh, well, no, no, really.

I show.

Okay, so again, we're going north and south.

And we're going east and west.

And then I guess we're going to the North Pole, okay.

Or maybe a little bit off.

So.

So what we've done is we've created a framework, then what you're going to do with the flowers is just put them in between all of the other ones that I did.

Alright, let's see if the student can do this.

Oh, most definitely.

This is coming together.

Oh, it is?

Yes.

It's it is just spectacular.

And it just really helps to cut them all the same length, then there's not a whole lot to have to think about.

Or Or do and if we have an extra one, you know, there.

Wow.

Wow.

I mean, that's so so how much would that be at the florist?

I'm not really sure.

But wow, definitely.

And then you know, if we want to add any pics, or you know holiday ribbon or something, you know we can we can change those out.

So you couldn't do this for Valentine's you for your Valentine.

You could make your own arrangement and you know i i spent $5 Wow, I am really impressed.

But yeah, so those are some of the great gift great decor personally if you just wanted to keep it but I mean you could give to this to someone and they will be so sure if you have a shut in you know, or or you know, a relative or something or you're going to a holiday party.

You know you will be the guest with the best that's right you know Adding a bottle of vintage or something, but being now with this, how long will it stay this fresh looking this beautiful.

With regular watering?

Yes, you do need to check the water level.

And that's why I like to use the white or diamond the clear vase, so I can kind of see how much is in there.

And it'll take up water the first day pretty rapidly.

So you want to water it once you're finished, and then water it again, maybe before you go to bed.

But it should last probably about a week.

And the Greens will last considerably longer, the flowers will eventually start to fade.

And these little berries were kind of beginning to go a little bit but and even if you plucked those out before we even put the color in, it was still absolutely gorgeous.

It was so easy to do a couple of weeks out of this maybe even longer with just the green.

Yes, yes.

And and you could take out those flowers put in some new flower.

Yes.

So this is our first creation.

Lovely.

And what are we going to make next?

Well, we're going to make a porch pot for outdoors.

So it can be any size pot that you want.

And I've lined it with some newspaper just to keep the potting soil from coming out of the drain holes in the bottom.

The reason that I chose this black one is that we can then set it into a more decorative container.

And that way when spring comes, we just take this one out.

And we're ready to go again with with that.

So we'll bring this back when we're finished finished product.

Okay, right.

So the good thing to talk about again, is, like I said, the base of this arrangement is can be purchased greens, but let's hope that you have some things that you're growing at your, at your house.

And some of the things that you can grow that I think are really nice to add are the the dog wood stamps.

So this is yellow wood, or yellow twig dogwood, and I did bring red.

So we've got some red here.

And then this was a birch branch that has been painted white.

So these are some things that we can add to add heights to our arrangement.

And again, we're going to use the greens that we find in our landscapes.

Is this from the neighbor's?

Yeah, we're not falling tree falling white pine is, but you can use you.

I mean, this is just everybody.

The library probably has a you.

But um, there we go.

We're back with our boxwood, again, this is a broadleaf add for green, great texture, a very municipal juniper.

These you can find these growing on the side of the road, the Western or the eastern red cedar, but I have some spreading junipers that I can cut different spruce, this happens to be a weeping spruce.

And I kind of like the weeping spruce because it's going to hang over the edge sort of cascade, right arrangement.

Another one caught my eye.

Well, this is our provider.

This is from a fan from a green giant are providing.

And, again, our white pine, the neighbor's white pine.

Thank you neighbors, yes, do they watch the show?

I'm gonna have to buy their tree featured.

And then of course, some spruce.

And remember, there's lots of different kinds of spruce.

And a lot of them have some really large branches that are going to give our container some height.

And the first thing we have to decide is, is this going to be flat up against the garage?

Or is it going to be you know, out there there?

Yeah, that we'd see around, we're going to say it's going to be up by the garage.

So we're going to actually put it in towards the back the back.

Yeah.

So you can see here, a lot of space here in the front, right to continue decorating.

Right, exactly.

And so and we sort of layer in maybe by height, or what's your, what's your method, my method is to just kind of fill in different things.

So here's a big piece of spruce.

We took the center out, and now we have this and we're again, we don't really have to worry too much.

We're just going to add this because see how it's going to kind of lay out and about and then we're going to get on dirt, doing it from the back, but we're just adding other greens.

Now if you only had a juniper.

You can do this with just a juniper But having all these other textures, you know, just really adds so much.

I really love that all of this is just stuff laying around.

While growing, it's growing.

Yes.

Now well, I mean, material wise, yeah, go out and just collect this.

You don't have to go out and spend a lot.

You can just go out and find these in a tree.

Right?

Right.

That's apparent to me.

And the one thing is you do, all of these are evergreens.

And really, Evergreens are not supposed to be pruned in the winter, necessarily, but what we're doing is removing maybe an entire branch that might, you know, be in the way or something or removing a lower branch, whatever.

But again, we can finish off with some boxwoods for texture.

And then like I said, we have some weeping.

Oh, and you know, when you're using this, have you looked at your Yes.

They can get kind of sappy.

Yes.

So most of the times I'm if I'm really doing this outs, I'm doing this outside a lot.

You know, like on my front porch.

No need to bring all this into the house.

I just wear gloves.

But if you do get SAP on your hands, easy way to get it off to you know, eat it.

Just kidding.

Yeah, sorry.

Oh, you don't want to use gasoline and you you could use, you know, rubbing alcohol, but it's so drying on your hands.

So what you do is you have a paper towel, we had the paper time.

Do you want to do a demonstration?

Well, I didn't bring any Oh God King, cooking spray oil.

You know?

Can I say?

Pam?

Yeah.

Pam.

Yes.

Whatever your favorite.

What?

You just spray your hands.

And it comes off, Rob real good here, then use the paper towel.

And it should pretty much come off.

And then you can wash your hands noted, you know?

So it does.

It does really work well.

So this is just kind of four minutes.

Well, we're there.

We're there.

But we're doing good.

So I think, don't we have kind of enough in there.

So now we have to decide.

What else could we do?

And again, these don't have to be for Christmas.

You leave your porch pots out by next season, right?

Oh, yeah.

And this is Winterberry.

Holly, this is a deciduous Holly.

It's Ilex verticillata.

And so it has some fruit.

So you can you know, you can grow this in your garden and then you can cut some of the branches for winter.

Also, oh, I'm sorry, these were one other thing I was going to show was if we were going to do it in like a can.

And you can use some chicken wire in there to help vaporize the branches.

Yeah, always thinking this one.

That's it?

Well, you know, everybody has a lot of hydrangeas.

So you could spray paint these.

Yes.

Your your favorite color for the holidays, we can add a spray painted hydrangea.

Again, we had the real quick oh, we're going to add our beautiful.

We're gonna make our stems just a little shorter.

But again, they go just right in.

And then we've added we've got a bow and some cones.

And so we've wired they both have wire and the easy way to attach them is just with a like a skewer.

Yeah, barbecue.

Yeah.

So we're just gonna wrap that around.

Yeah, here's our kebab.

Here's our bow.

We're gonna just wrapped that around.

It's so easy.

It's well one.

We've, I've done it for a long time.

So here's our bow.

I almost brought hedge balls.

You know if you had the Grinch colored tree, that's right, use that green of the hedge balls.

Look at that.

So here's an you just put that right outside the door.

It's right outside the door and, and again, we're going to drop it down into a more decorative pod.

And look at that.

Look what else just built right here on the set.

Here we are.

Take the bowl off leave the bowl on at a snowman sure mad valentine's day you got a little hearts in there.

And another thing is they do make this anti transparent.

This one's called wilt stop.

There's a wilt proof too.

But this would help.

You know you can spray the Greens before you put in the bow.

We could have sprayed the Greens before we put in the flowers just helps to give it some extra time.

I feel like a professional All right now thank you so much.

Hello.

Oh, your enjoyed it.

Yes.

And we enjoyed having you and thank you so much for watching.

I hope you create one of these version of this for yourself at home.

Thanks for watching.

If you need to contact us, you could drop us an email at your garden@gmail.com or search for us on Facebook, and we'll see you next time.