Front Porch Flowers

I admit it–I’m house proud.  I just love the look of our big, old, classic turn of the century home with it’s steep rooflines and the big wrap around porch.

One of the things I look forward to most every spring is the chance to bring the ferns that I’ve overwintered out of the house and hang them again, and to cover the railings with their planters full of wave petunias!  Walmart wanted us to write a post about sprucing up the lawn and garden for spring–and that worked out just great since I always buy my plants and supplies for my front porch from Walmart anyway.

If you’ve ever planted annuals, you know it can run a pretty penny.  I’ve been known to spend over $200 on flowers, easy.  There are planters, soil, the plants themselves. . . luckily many of those costs are one time in nature, and eventually all you have to do is buy new flowers and occasionally refresh your soil.

We moved into our house about 6 years ago now.  There were some flower box brackets on the front porch, but I didn’t like their placement.  I also didn’t like the flower boxes the previous owners had left.  I headed out to Walmart and bought some new brackets and six long Mainstays self watering planters.

We filled the planters up with potting soil, put 5 wave petunias in each and had a fantastic show of flowers all summer.

The next year I simply used the same soil and planted more wave petunias.  I also bought a couple of nice Boston ferns at Walmart and changed them over into hanging self watering planters that matched my window box style ones.  That fall I brought the ferns into the house to overwinter them–I’ve now had the same ferns for 4 years!  They look a bit scruffy in the spring, but sunlight and fresh air does wonders for them and they are soon back to full, lush plants.

By the third year, it was time to refresh the soil a bit.  I took a tarp, laid it down in the backyard and dumped all the soil from all the planters out into it.  Then I added a bag of potting soil from Walmart and some Miracle Gro organic fertilizer.  Using a hoe I mixed and mixed until it was all incorporated.

Meanwhile I set the kids to spraying down the planters so they don’t look so grungy.  Then we refilled all the planters, planted in new petunias and set them back on the porch!

It’s turned into a routine!  Sometimes I fill up three extra planters with flowers and stick them on the steps for color.  Last year Better Homes and Gardens sent me a fantastic tall red planter that they are selling at Walmart.  I filled it with flowers from the garden department and put by the door.  You add a bit.  You take away a bit.  But the planter boxes with petunias and the ferns come back every year.

This year it was time to refresh the soil a bit again.  I put out the cleaned up ferns and added a couple of gorgeous mixed hanging baskets from the garden center (repotted into self watering planters of course) and filled the boxes with red Petunias–(not wave this year–the Walmart garden center only had the wave petunias in purple and pink, and I had my heart set on red).  They start out small, but in a couple of weeks they will start blooming and really showing off their color.

Here is the before and after!  It looks pretty now, but it will look gorgeous in 2 or 3 weeks as the flowers bloom and grow, and the ground in front of the porch fills in with the hostas and blueberry bushes.

I’m very pleased with how it turned out!

I also decided it was time to stop chasing down the watering can all the time (the one I’ve had for years is used for the herb planters, the front porch and sometimes the garden)–so I bought a snazzy red watering can that will live on the porch.  The bright color goes with my wicker!

What are your plans for flowers this year?

****This is a sponsored post****

Disclosure: As a participant in the Walmart Moms Program, I’ve received compensation for my time and efforts in creating this post. All thoughts and opinions are my own.