2017 Flower and Garden Festival

Andrew and I went to Epcot's Flower and Garden Festival a couple weekends ago. We always say we are going to go earlier, say in March when it is actually nice out and you don't have to run from one shady area to another. For whatever reason, we end up going in late May. Not the smartest choice in the world! Even then, it's always worth it to check out because they do such a great job on the event. The flowers are always amazing and it's a great learning opportunity, especially now that we are homeowners looking to create a garden of our own. 

It's basically one of my new hobbies: to walk around a garden or event that has information about plants and flowers and try to take in as much of it as possible. I take pictures of little plant signs or just a photo of the flower with hopes that in the future I'll find someone who can identify it. It's helping me learn so much and I plan to use all this newfound knowledge to create a sustainable yard and garden of my own. I know it will be a real "learn as I go" process. I've collected info from Leu Gardens, Oakland Nature Preserve, Epcot Flower and Garden Festival, and the annual Spring Fever in the Garden that Winter Garden hosts. I'll talk about all the other places soon, but here are some (not the best quality) photos from our Flower and Garden trip :)

NOTE TO SELF: FIND THESE PURPLE FLOWERS

CONTAINER GOALS

PENTAS! PENTAS!

ALMOST LOOKS LIKE AN ENGLISH GARDEN!

The cool thing about this experience was seeing so many flowers and plants that I now know from my recent discoveries (Andrew was really impressed as I kept pointing and saying "pentas! pentas" over and over). All this research is starting to pay off! ;) It's exciting to be at the beginning of it all, there's so much to learn. I'm most interested in bird and butterfly attracting plants, native species, which plants act as natural pest repellants, companion plants, and what are considered annuals and perennials in Florida (nerd alert!). It is so, so different gardening in Florida compared to the other states in the country. Thank goodness for my Florida Gardening magazine subscription! (I'm sure I'll discuss at some point). 


Until next year, F&G! 

PS: Got any favorite garden information destinations of your own?