Planting a Perennial Garden

Planting a Perennial Garden 

Here is a great money saving tip, as the Garden Center’s mark down perennial plants at the end of the season, why not scoop them up and plant a perennial garden for next year?

You guys know how I love a pretty garden area. In fact, my previous home looked like an English cutting garden, and was one of the contributing factors of my home selling in under 2 weeks of being listed on the market, lol. I mean I got to say, it was hard for me to move away from being able to cut fresh flowers at all times from my own yard and going to nothing, but starting over has been fun too. I know what I like and what I think grows well in the Georgia, however the weather has been throwing me a few curve balls this year, and the climate is slightly different where we are located now.The majority of the flowers I added in my previous yard, since we were just starting out, came from collecting clearance and marked down, end of season perennial plants that the growers wanted to move out of their inventory.  The Speedwell seen above, we were able to pick up for only $1.99 a container instead of $5.99. The key word in that statement is “perennial,” meaning they will come back each year, unlike an annual that has to planted every year. You can get some nice varieties of perennial plants that will survive in your growing zone, you will be saving yourself some money and work in the long run. Since perennials come back every year, they will start to establish a nice deep root system which means they will get bigger fast each consecutive year. If you are looking for a great gardening reference guide be sure to check out my friend Nan over at the Gardener’s Path, she has a great site filled with planting tips.

In addition to being attractive to bees and butterflies, which will pollinate your garden, some perennials even reseed themselves at the end of the season. Which then creates new additional plants for the following year. This makes them similar to bulbs, so they can be divided at the end of the season. Which allows you to split large plants off and have more plants or even gift them to a few of your neighbors, which so many of mine have so kindly done for me, and I plan to keep that tradition going once mine get a little bigger.

Creating a Perennial Garden

The first thing in creating a perennial garden is deciding where you want to place it. You will obviously want to put it in an area that gets a fair amount of sun, depending on your plants. You also would want to select an area where you would see your lovely plants too. In our case we selected an area that is challenging to mow and the grass is not looking so great anyways. This area also backs up to a patio where we have placed a bench, so it no longer gets thru traffic. So, we decided to continue the planter bed that already runs the length of our home to make the new perennial garden. First we removed the grass by using a flat shovel, if you do this carefully you can create sod pieces that can be used to fill in areas in your yard that might be patchy. Once the grass is removed you will want to layout where your plants are going in the newly formed bed. In our local garden center today we have lucked upon some gorgeous Coneflower, Black Eyed Susan’s and Crystal Peak Obedient plants for our DIY butterfly garden. These will all be great pollinators and provide pretty spring, summer and fall color for our garden, for years to come.Make sure to refer to the growing chart on the plant and place the taller plants to the back of your garden. While this might seem like a very basic tip, let me just say; the landscapers installing our plants when we closed on our home actually placed the five gigantic shrubs you now see along the side of my house, in the picture above, in front of tiny miniature boxwoods in my front planter bed. This was directly off of my front porch, which I knew had to be moved and were immediately moved one month after closing.  As you can see now, we would have 6-8 ft tall shrubs blocking my front porch. As you plant each of the plants you will want to dig the hole slightly bigger than the plant and we always amend our soil. I am sure that in other areas you can probably get away with not amending your soil, but here in Georgia we have red clay soil so it must be amended. Our secret mix is soil conditioner and growing mix.

Once you have planted your beauties, always makes sure to mulch them properly. Mulch will help to hold water in your beds and keep the weeds out. In our previous yard we used to place landscape fabric down for weed control, but I have since given up on that process. I personally have realized that I would rather spend the money on mulch and if you mulch it thick enough you will not have a weed problem, and your plant moisture levels will be better. Besides weeds will grow through the landscape fabric after a year or two anyways, so why bother?

Another great gardening tip I have learned over the years, is to always keep one of each plant tag for reference. I have found that these can be of value later down the road. I like to be able to review the specific manufacture growing specifications for each plant for pruning times, fertilization, plant variety, and bloom times. Also they come in handy if you need to replace a specific type of plant due to disease and you want to match the grouping or color cluster. 

*Please note that this post may contain affiliate links for your convenience. These involve no extra cost to you, but may result in me receiving a small commission – for which I am very grateful! You can view my full advertising disclosure here.

I personally use an inexpensive Dollar Tree plastic storage bin to keep them in with my other gardening supplies in the basement. These bins are really perfect for bulb storage for the winter months, gloves, shovels, garden stakes and other muddy or dirty yard tools. Since they are plastic, they clean up easily and since they are from the Dollar Tree you can easily replace them if they break or if you need additional bins for your growing gardening needs.

  • Gardener Tip- I have started storing them in a sheet protector pockets in a binder for easier access with tabs labeled tree, shrubs, perineal and bulbs for easier reference.

We did add this sweet little vintage garden window over my truck bench, I really think this is the perfect finishing touch for this sweet little perennial garden, and it gives the illusion of a garden wall, or even the side of the house.You can see the full post post here: DIY Antique Garden Window Project

Like this post you can read more of our fun garden posts here:

Growing Your Own Perfect Peonies

Easy Container Garden Combinations

Creating A Four Seasons Garden

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*Please note that this post may contain affiliate links for your convenience. These involve no extra cost to you, but may result in me receiving a small commission – for which I am very grateful! You can view my full advertising disclosure here.

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46 Comments

  1. So glad you find this post helpful Katie! I promise now is the time of year to buy perennials since they will come back every year, you will save a ton on moola. If you are not sure about the variety of plant, you can google the specifics for your growing zone to check it out.

  2. Foria lena

    This is a great blog. I am pretty much impressed with your good work. You really put out very helpful information.

  3. Oh, I love this post. I’m a gardener at heart, but sadly don’t have a green thumb. Our yard is quite large and was very overgrown when we bought the place – we’ve been battling with it ever since. My dream is to have an English tea garden – wild, yet tamed. Right, now though, I think some perennial gardens would be a good start!

  4. Farmhouse Fixer Upper

    I love the garden, but I really love how you hung that old reclaimed window, that is so me. It is super sweet how you gave props to your neighbor for the idea too, I bet she is just beaming that you mentioned her in your post, I know I would be. Your a good egg Jen Gainer 🙂

  5. Tracy @ Cleland Clan

    How beautiful! I love how you laid out the plants in their pots. I need to remember to do that.

  6. Lauren

    This is such an informative post. I have a black thumb and can use all the help I can get.

  7. I really like your little variation and how you explain every little thing with the help of pictures. Commendable! Love it. I’ll definitely make this little perennial garden when I shifted in my new house.

  8. We used weed mats, but they don’t work. at all. Weeds are cropping up everywhere and I’m trying not to look at them. I’ll probably have to get proper mulch to handle them. Thanks for your tips.

  9. You know Jo, we have all bought the weed mats and tuff blocker in hopes that it would work, but unfortunately they just deteriorate like anything else put in the ground. I will say when we young, and had no money at all, we used wet newspaper and it actually worked pretty well for about a year. So I guess I should say it worked as well as the plastic weed shields you can buy, plus it was free and the perfect way to compost or recycle, LOL.

  10. Oh Lindsay thank you and I am so laughing out loud about the “good egg” part, that is just too funny! Now I will be speaking in my Veruca Salt voice for the rest of the day which will thrill my husband to no end 😀 “Because I want a Oompa Loompa NOW!!!!!” YEs say a little prayer for Mr. Gainer it will be long day for him.

  11. I love seeing peoples beautiful flowers. I live in an apartment so the most I can do is a couple of containers on my patio.

  12. Laura you should do a vertical garden, up and exterior wall if you have a patio, that is removable of course. Those are so hot right now and perfect for limited space.

  13. Awesome garden and flowers and a great tutorial.

  14. We have a few perennials and I love how they come back every year. Such an easy way to keep the garden up.

  15. I’ve always loved gardening and you have provided so much insight here! Thank you! Also, love that window accent, and the truck tailgate bench!

  16. Karla

    Very helpful post! I’m into gardening but I don’t have enough space in our place right now. Your perennial garden is beautiful and relaxing. Thanks for the tutorial! Love it!

  17. These flowers look so good and such great tips on gardening. A great helpful post indeed. Keep up the good work.

  18. What a beautiful garden! Your old garden sounds like a paradise, I have always wanted a large garden filled with flowers to cut and arrange. I like your tip about buying perennials when they are marked down! I like doing this with planters during the end of the season…it’s a great way to save some money!!

  19. What a gorgeous garden you have! I love the pop of magenta.

  20. sunshine and daisies

    Oh Jen I love this window and you know I love that bench. Your yard always gives me such inspiration and now I know you secrets, catching those end of season deals, that is so smart.

  21. This is beautiful! I love perennials. Living in an apartment I need things that are smaller containers and these are perfect!

  22. This is a beautiful garden. I don’t really know what I’m doing in my garden but it looks beautiful somehow. You’ve inspired me to learn more though.

  23. I’d never thought of this what a good idea. It looks beautiful 💗

  24. Cass

    This is a great idea! First love all the flowers you chose and that dodge bench is so so cool!

  25. I love reusing things, this is such a great idea with the window, so cute! Beautiful flowers too, wow!

  26. Angela Hoyos

    I absolutely love this! what a lovely little perennial garden. I can’t wait to buy a house just so I can arrange my own garden. Thank you for the inspo, I love reading your posts – I’m always left inspired.

  27. I can’t wait to plant some perennials again! These are gorgeous.

  28. We’ve been planting native flowering plants and have seen tons of bees and hummingbirds. So lovely.

  29. Monica Simpson

    My husband has been working really hard on our perennial garden this summer. I love how you incorporated the old window!

  30. Windy

    I don’t have a green thumb but the way you provide the steps, I would love to create a garden like this because it’s so beautiful.

  31. This is a helpful read. I am tired of planting flowers every year. Perennial plants will save me tons of money and time.

  32. What a beautiful garden. I love the window accent on the side of the porch. A perfect space for enjoying nature.

  33. Perennials are my absolute favorite and love seeing them come back year after year!

  34. Digitaldaybook

    I love these gardening tips and ideas!

  35. Kimmy

    You have a beautiful garden

  36. Such a helpful post! I love all the colors you have in your garden! I am working on mine looking similar, but it will take a few years!

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