Dogwood in Sonoma
Over the weekend my parents spotted some beautiful dogwoods in bloom at a nearby winery, so I stopped by to see them too. I’ve not seen dogwood trees in years because they are not often grown in gardens here. Dogwood prefers cooler summers and more winter chill than we have, but these at the winery had the typical lush showy leaves and gorgeous blooms, some white and some soft blush pink, that make them so special. I thought I’d share these photos that I took.
I’ve sent out a few testers of the new summer floral to get some initial feedback, and then I’ll tweak and send out more testers. I’d like to add a little more of a fresh note to counter sweetness but I’ll see what people think before I tinker too much more.
My graphic artist hopes to finish the box design by this weekend and I’m excited to move forward on that project. I will be doing two companion boxes that will be identical except for the imagery — one for the more floral scents and one for the woodsier scents. I plan to let people request one or the other if they have a preference, but each scent will have a standard default choice.
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This weekend my brother will be back up to visit, partly to celebrate my Dad’s birthday. My Mom, Dad, brother, and sister-in-law all have birthdays between May and July so it keeps things busy.
There are a number of dogwoods where I work and on lunch breaks, I go dogwood and lilac peeping! The foliage reminds me so much of basil leaves, I expect that gorgeous herbal smell to waft from them.
I’m looking forward to learning more about your new Summer floral!
That sounds beautiful — dogwoods and lilacs! Both of those are more rare here in our climate. Sounds like a good way to spend a lunch break! 🙂
My mother loved dogwoods. We’re lucky in the northeast/mid-Adlantic states to have the ideal condition for them to flourish. They give a spectacular show in the springtime between late April and Early May. We have 2 pinks and 1 white in our yard.
Also looking forward to the new scents!
a:)
That sounds beautiful!
Beautiful pictures! Dogwood is our state tree, and we have lots of them, but blooms have been gone for almost a month now.
I have three dogwoods right off my back patio, and usually the birds eat the fruit throughout the late Fall, once the berries get red. Last Fall they seemed to leave them, and I wondered why, until one morning the trees were still coverered when I went to work and totally stripped bare by the time I got back home in the afternoon. It had been a fairly nice day, but that night the temp dropped and we had an ice storm. I was fascinated to think that somehow the birds “knew” to save the fruit until they had to eat it.
That’s a sweet story! Wonder how they knew the ice storm was coming. I’ve not seen dogwood berries before. Bet those trees are pretty!
The green centers will eventually grow into berries that will turn red into the fall. So watch those dogwoods! See here:
http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://0.tqn.com/d/gardening/1/0/f/a/Dogwood_Berries2.jpg&imgrefurl=http://gardening.about.com/od/galleryofgardens/ig/Red-Flowers-and-Foliage/Dogwood-Berries.htm&usg=__k4xJwR-ac9Eeh4_XI58xCFjB_vg=&h=375&w=500&sz=89&hl=en&start=0&sig2=OV6HwoquGI3HMsqsXcWF6Q&zoom=1&tbnid=YbXA7oPBG0c43M:&tbnh=163&tbnw=229&ei=hrbfTZz1L-Tg0QG41sSoCg&prev=/search%3Fq%3Ddogwood%2Bberries%26hl%3Den%26biw%3D1060%26bih%3D849%26gbv%3D2%26tbm%3Disch&itbs=1&iact=rc&dur=612&page=1&ndsp=17&ved=1t:429,r:10,s:0&tx=162&ty=72&biw=1060&bih=849
I guess I need to learn how to use the tiny url thingie! lol!
I was thinking the same thing — I’ll look again in fall (if I beat the birds eating them!). That’s one long link, lol, but it worked!
These are the Kousa dogwoods, aren’t they? So pretty. I love our native Eastern ones better, personally – they grow wild in the woods here – but I think the berries on the Kousas are so intriguing!
Hi mals! They didn’t have tags but they look like Cornus kousa to me too. I’ve not seen many dogwood varieties though so I’m not 100% sure. That would be fun to have them growing wild!