Saturday, August 01, 2015

New plants!

New arrivals are in our garden, and just waiting to go home with you! We just got a new stock of Annie's Annuals & Perennials on our shelves, as well as a HUGE selection of air plants. 

Check out some of our summer goodies:

Airplants

Have you tried out air plants yet? Easy to grow, fun, and super weird, they meet all of our requirements for an awesome plant. We have a big selection that just arrived last week - over 100 plants! Stop in and check them out!

Psoralea pinnata “Kool-Aid Bush”


This South African shrub or small tree is a a great choice to bring some height and interest to your garden. It reaches to about 12 feet in height, with dense soft needle like foliage - super cool.  It is said to bloom in it's first year, featuring bright lavender blue, sweet pea like flowers. And the name? The comes from the sweet scent of the blooms. Really fun, cool plant!

Asarina scandens ‘Sky Blue'

Asarina is a type of vine that is easy to grow, hardy, and comes in a variety of colors. The "Sky Blue" variety is one of our very favorites, though, and not one that we get in all that often! Fast growing, it reaches 8-10 feet in it's spread. It's great on a trellis, on a wall that needs coverage, or even a pot!


Crassula capitella “Red Pagoda”

This plant just looks so...geometric. Architectural. We LOVE LOVE LOVE it! Hardy, full sun, low water, great as a border plant or in a pot, and it blooms super cute white flowers in the summer time! 

We, of course, have much more than this in stock right now. Come on in and check us out - we are open every day from 10am - 5pm.

Wednesday, July 01, 2015

4th of July celebration and thank you!

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Johnnye Merle’s and Country Roads Antiques will be open this July 4th from 10am – 3pm. 

We are spending the 4th holding a special celebration in appreciation of all of our awesome customers over the years! Country Roads is in our 23rd year of business, and Johnnye Merle’s just celebrated our 10th anniversary. All things said and done, the best part of what we do is getting to build relationships and friendships.
To celebrate, we decided to throw a 4th of July BBQ! We’ll have free hot (and veggie!) dogs, s’mores, & lemonade, store wide sales on all sorts of vintage goodies, free mini-flags to show your July 4th spirit, sunflower seed plantings for the kids, and special plant discounts! 

We are only going to be open from 10am - 3pm, so be sure to stop in during those hours, say hello, and take part in the celebration!

Thanks for all of the amazing support of the years! We hope to see you this weekend!


Saturday, May 09, 2015

New plants!

You are following us on Facebook, right? We post our regular updates there, though we are still keeping this blog up and going, too!

New plants are coming in every Friday this time of year! Yesterday brought some fun goodie's from Annie's Annuals - check out a few photos below!




Sunday, April 05, 2015

Milkweed

We finally have asclepias back in stock! Milkweeds, the common name for these plants, are popular as they attract butterflies and caterpillars (don't worry, the plant has mechanisms to grow back quickly as the caterpillars munch!) and are a great way to bring some nature into your own garden! As you can see in this photo, butterflies were already stopping in to say hello...


Saturday, February 21, 2015

New Plant Saturday for February 21st

Happy weekend, garden geeks!

This week we received a big order of all sorts of new goodies from Annie's Annuals & Perennials! Check out a few of our favorites below!
(all photos courtesy of Annie's Annuals!)

Aeoniums 

We are a HUGE fan of this family of plants! Easy to grow, funky & fun, they bring a delightful dynamic to ANY style of garden! We have several varieties in stock right now:

 Aeonium cilatum
 Aeonium heirrense - huge, and really cool 'trunk'!
 Aeonium simsii - small and super cute!
Aeonium urbicum - huge flower head!
Aeonium "Sunburst" - one of our favorites, great color!

Delphiniums 
We have LOTS of delphiniums in stock right now, about 8 different varieties, in fact! Two new ones just arrived from Annie's: Double Innocence, grown for it's striking bright white blooms, and "True Wild Form", a hard to find specimen that is super hardy and almost electric blue in color!



Hollyhocks

Towering giants of any garden, Hollyhocks are quite easy to grown, and fairly drought tolerant once established. They are a bit prone to a rust that affects just their family of plants. While it's not all that pretty, it's not really going to damage the plant, is easy to address, and really, a few dots on a leave are worth it when you see the blooms these plants produce! We have the varieties below in stock right now; all take full sun, average to low water (once established) and will grow between 4-8 feet tall!

 Hollyhock "Halo Apricot"
 Hollyhock "Halo Blossom"
 Hollyhock "Black Knight"
 Hollyhock "Halo Cerise"
Hollyhock "Halo Lavender"

Papaver Poppies

Another late winter/early spring favorite: poppies! These are not your run of the mill poppies, though. These unusual specimens - many of them 'heirloom plants' that have been around for centuries!  are grown for their show stopping, fun blooms! Check out a few of the ones we have in stock right now:
 "Ladybird"
 "Crimson Feathers"
 "Danbrog"
 "Lavender Fringed"
 "Lavender Semi-Double"
 "Orange Chiffon"
 "Queen's Poppy"
 "Sugar Plum"


This is, of course, just the tip of our 'new plant iceberg'! Other new plants from Annie's include Petunia axillaris, the popular California Ranunculus, all sorts of Salvias, and some really cute violas! Plus, we have a great selection available from some of our native growers, lots of succulents, and more!

The nursery is looking really nice and full right now, a great time to stop in and visit us, and perhaps take home some of your very own botanical goodies!

Saturday, February 14, 2015

President's Day Weekend SALE & New Plants

The air is full of pollen and love at Johnnye Merle's today!

As part of Country Roads Antiques & Gardens President's Day Weekend celebration, all of our plants will be 20% off! "OMG, for reals???" For reals, indeed.

All those cool new Annie's Annuals & Perennials, the great new stuff from Native Sons Wholesale Nursery, all the fun new seasonal color, all of the AWESOME herbs and veggies: on sale! We don't have many sales, only a few a year, so be sure to stop in and take advantage of these great garden discounts!

New plants for this week: fairy garden low growers, including Leptinella Platt's Black, Irish moss, baby tears and ivy. A BIG selection of Delphiniums, all sorts of cool blues and even a dark blue 'almost black'. Juncus spiralis, the 'corkscrew grass' that everyone is obsessed with (which we have in super cute, small 2" sized pots for a very low price!), some great 'Valentine color', Jasmine wreaths (and a few Jasmine hearts, but get them while you can, as they will be moving fast today!), Nemesia "Shooting Stars" (check out the photo below!), Clarkia (in six packs!), Heliophila "Angel Eyes" (also in demand and will probably go fast!), and lots of other cottage garden goodies!

With the sale prices in effect for only three days, stop in sooner than later and take advantage of the great prices on some very cool plants!

Friday, February 13, 2015

Correa pulchella

We love the bloom of Correa pulchella, more commonly known as "Pink Australian Fuchsia". It's a low growing shrub - maybe 2 or 3 feet tall - drought tolerant, hardy, and delightful! We have them in one gallon sized containers right now.

We are picking up some more plant for the weekend ahead, too: juncus spiralis, cyclamen, primula, jasmine: all sorts of fun, Valentine themed colors, too!

Will we see you in our garden this weekend?

PS: This weekend is all the big President's Day Weekend Sale! Plants will be discounted, as will all sorts of other goodies throughout Country Roads. Pop in and see us!

Saturday, February 07, 2015

New plant Saturday: 2/7/15

New plant Saturday is here, garden geeks!

New this week: an order full of really cool, unusual grasses, ferns, abutilon (Chinese lanterns), Australian natives and ‘ground covers’ like Scleranthus uniflorus, pictured below!

New herbs and winter veggies! We will profile more of these later on, but we always love to get in a fun, fresh crop of edible plants that are very cool – grow your own green juice!

Winter color! New cyclamen, jasmine heart vines, stock, ‘shamrocks’, spiral grass and more!

Heart topiaries – get those Valentine gifts done and taken care of this weekend!

PLUS, we still have a TON of our Annie's Annuals in from last week, sedums and succulents from Native Sons and a whole lot more. Spring like weather has us keeping the nursery nice and full!

Hope you make it in to see us this weekend!

Saturday, January 31, 2015

New plant Saturday is here!

New plants have arrived! Our nursery is looking particularly full with all sorts of new arrivals from Annie's Annuals & Perennials and Native Sons Wholesale Nursery!

Annie’s fans: have you received your catalog yet? We have all your favorites in stock, with about (50!) new variety of plants arriving yesterday! We also have some really cool new plants from Native Son’s, another one of our favorite growers: lots of sedums, cool and unusual and DROUGHT TOLERANT California natives, and much more! We'll have a blog post up soon with more details of all that is now in stock...

We hope you can stop in and see us this weekend! Thanks for the ongoing support - we love our garden geek community!


Saturday, January 24, 2015

Happy weekend!

Let our gardens brighten up your weekend! 
Lots of wonderful plants are waiting to go home with you!


Saturday, January 10, 2015

New plants!

Hi garden geeks!

Below is a sampling of some of the new plants we just got in stock from Annie's Annuals! You can also email us with any questions or special requests!

Dianthus ‘Bliss’
“Perpetual Carnation”

This old fashioned dianthus is just adorable! We love it! We also have "Cheshire Cat", "Mad Hatter", and the "Queen of Hearts" dianthus in stock as well! All are in 4" containers.




Aeonium simsii
 This is a new aeonium for us, and we love it for its daintiness! It's small - maybe three inches across each 'bud', and grows low - almost a funky cool groundcover. The yellow flowers it produces in late spring are suppose to be quite amazing!
Delphinium elatum
‘Sweethearts’

Delphinium are among our most favorite of plants! This 'Sweethearts' variety does not disappoint - maybe we just have Valentine's Day on the brain already, but we loooove the sweet pink blooms! We have a few other varieties of delphinium in stock as well: "Bellamosum", "Dusky Maidens" and "Clivedon Beauty" are all available in 4" containers, ready to be planted now for some spring blooms!





Rhipsalis burchellii
"Mistletoe Cactus"

This meets our qualifications for "funky cool and weird"! We've never had this plant before, so it's new to us as well. Here is what Annie's website says: "This RARE & highly unusual plant is actually a thornless, tree-dwelling cactus! Best planted in a hanging basket or large container, it forms an elegant cascade of delicate branches than can reach down to 5’! Lovely creamy white flowers emerge along the stems, eventually making way for darling pink fruits. A wonderful choice for a shady patch of the garden or for keeping as a houseplant." We are pretty excited to try it out!

Lathyrus odoratus
‘Route 66'
Sweet Pea time is here! Oh, how we looooooove sweet peas! We'll find an excuse to plant this just about anywhere! "Route 66" is a new one for us this year - this fast growing variety has some pretty amazing two-toned color going on! In addition to "Route 66" we also have "Almost Black" "Annie B. Gilroy", "Blue Vein", "Cupani", and "Fire and Ice" in stock. These tend to sell out quick - and we will likely have more in next week (1/17/15), so email us if you are looking to come in after this weekend so we can make sure they are still in stock.



Aloe wickensii
Even if succulents aren't your thing, if you have a bit of space, this super cool aloe is worth it! The photo makes it look bigger than it is; the grower states it gets to the 2-3 foot range. The color is what makes it amazing; the plant itself kinda reminds us of...well, of a reptile! It has greens, and dark patches, and light patches - it's really cool! And the bi-color blooms, which will surprise you next winter, make this a really unusual specimen of aloe! We have it in 4" sized containers right now.





What else?
Also just arrived: two varieties of yarrow (achillea "Moonwalker" and "Rosey Red", both great drought tolerant, fun plants!), centaurea (bachelor buttons, our Grandma's favorite!) in blue and red, buddlea in white and blue, succulents, helleborus 'Gold Bullion' (which we LOVE!),  nicotiana in white and lime green, papaver poppies, salvia, verbascum and many more! This was a pretty big order, so lots of new goodies are to be seen!

Don't forget to follow us on Facebook and Instagram for more day to day updates!

Monday, January 05, 2015

Garden Geek Updates for the Week of January 5th

Happy happy new year, our fellow plant nerds! 


Garden Geek Updates for the week of January 5th 2015:

We have a biiiig order of Annie's Annuals arriving this week, likely in on either Thursday or Friday. Lots of fun goodies - big selection of sweet peas and poppies (including some new varieties!) for your winter gardens, some new succulents, and much more! If you have any special requests, be sure to email us with those by Tuesday (1/6/15) evening.

We should also be getting some more of the always popular ornamental kale and spiral grass later this week as well! And possibly some new and funky herbs and winter veggies - we'll know for sure in a day or so and will update accordingly.

We totally embraced this spirit of 2012 (a joke, get it?!?!) and finally started an Instagram account! Yay! Follow us there for daily photos of botanical goodness.


We are starting up our first new design project for 2015! A client in Los Angeles just got her turf removal rebate approved, and we are helping her design her new lawn free (ditch the lawn!), native plant, low water, awesome looking landscape! If you are interested in having us help you do the same, email us!

In the spirit of the new year, we put together some fun 'garden resolutions' to inspire your dirt digging this year. Check out our post for more info!

Speaking of new years resolutions, we are going to try to make sure we post a weekly update each and every Monday! If you are interested in staying on top of our latest breaking news, you can sign up to get these posts emailed to you (check out the form on the right side bar!) or follow us on Facebook.

Wishing you a happy and productive first week of our new year!

-Brande and the Johnnye Merle's team

Thursday, January 01, 2015

Garden Resolutions


Garden Resolution Time!
by Brande Jackson
 As we move into kicking off a brand new year, it only seems appropriate to think about ‘resolutions’. Going to the gym and stopping a bad habit often top the list for many, but for those of you that identify as ‘garden geeks’, thinking in terms of ‘botanical promises’ can also be helpful.
With that in mind, we present to your our suggested “Garden Resolutions for 2015”:
1. Compost more
Compositing is the best! Maybe not as exciting as Beyonce or ice cream, but it’s sooooo easy to do, and the benefits are numerous: you reduce waste going to a landfill, you feel less guilty about food that inevitably gets tossed, and you get the best free, (mostly) organic fertilizer you can ask for! There are all sorts of ways to compost, and a quick search online (we recommend using Pinterest!) will yield numerous possibilities. It need not be expensive, either: a compost pile can be as simple as that, a pile in a corner of your garden, or it can be a bit more involved with pre-fabricated containers that speed up the work that nature does.
2. Be adventurous
It’s easy to fall into a ‘garden rut’: sticking with the same tried and true plants can be fine, especially if you know what works for your garden, but at the same time, be bold! Go beyond your normal range. Try out plants that offer contrasting foliage and color. Try growing plants you can eat. Try out plants that just sound weird and funky and cool and fun to grow!
3. Plant your new babies ASAP
Many a plant has left our nursery only to meet its demise tucked away in the yard of a well-meaning garden geek that just never got around to planting it! The plants you buy at the nursery do in fact have a shelf life, they aren’t meant to live in that little container forever. Try to make it a habit to get them into the ground, or in a pot, or even into a bigger container within a week or two after purchasing.
4. Get your tools together
This is a resolution we at Johnnye Merle’s are going to try to follow this year. Our tools are a bit of a mess: some broken, some dull, some taken over by our four year old nephew... Keeping tools in good shape isn’t just about organization, either: dull blades on clippers and sheaths can actually damage plants with rough cuts, if not cleaned properly tools can carry disease from plant to plant, and bad tools make gardening a whole lot less fun. Search online for some ideas on how to best store your tools to keep them in tip-top shape.
5. Go native!
Look, we all have those plants we love and will baby and grow no matter what, and that is fine…so long as that only represents a small percentage of your yard. Despite the wet conditions this winter, the bottom line is that we live a bit of a “life of illusion” in Southern California when it comes to water use and the plants that we choose for our gardens.  Going native isn’t just about saving water: native plants provide an important habitat for wildlife, including the bees and other pollinators that are critical to the health of your garden, and the larger ecosystem. We have a huge selection of native plants in our nursery, and are happy to show you ways to go native AND look good!
6. Ditch the lawn!
On that same note, maybe this is the year that you give up your lawn - it’s much easier than you probably think! Many cities are now offering rebates, meaning, getting rid of your lawn and replacing it with drought tolerant plants could be just about free for you (depending on where you live) AND save you money on water in the long run as well. We have a simple, straightforward design package to help homeowners “ditch the lawn”, you can learn more at: www.ditchthelawn.com
7. Spend more time in your garden
Yes, this sounds very touchy-feely, but studies have proven that gardening is a great antidote to stress! According to an article in USA Today last year, there is even a field emerging called “horticulture therapy”, which is aimed at using gardening to help people cope with anxiety and depression, and even recover from surgery. Don’t think of your gardening time as merely a hobby, you are beautifying the landscape, helping out our ecosystem, AND helping your brain!

Hopefully this list inspires you to get outside and dig in the dirt!
Brande Jackson is the owner of Johnnye Merle’s Gardens, located in Country Roads in Old Town Orange at 204 W. Chapman. www.purtyplants.com.  She can be reached at brande@johnnyemerles.com.  She is also a teacher, and offers classes on art, creativity and gardening. www.brandejackson.com