fancy dahlias

i suppose this is my annual cafe au lait dahlia post -- cafe au laits are the fanciest of the fancy.  they bloom big and plentiful, so much so that i have a hard time keeping up.  i have 20 of them in my dahlia patch.  why so many?  unfortunately the shelf life on these girls aren't so terrific compared to other varieties so i keep plenty on hand for back-up.  they're a terrible tease really -- their petals unfurl so perfectly and then they fall apart within three days. ("...it's like i loved you so much and now i just hate you....")  if you readers have any advice on them, please let me know.

it's been a while since i made a large arrangement for no reason at all.  perhaps in the city, i really don't like spending lots of $$$ on foliage and foraging in urban areas isn't my thing (i've seen rats running in and out of gardens at all hours of the day and it's enough to deter me from even getting a community plot).  in the country, however, things grow wild and i get to wander around the edge of the woods to find material.  i didn't stray into the woods because there were still too many mosquitoes and i still can't tell the difference between poison ivy and wild raspberries / blackberries.

anyways, back to the flowers.  everything in this arrangement is sourced within 100 yards of each other.  it's a funny, but good, feeling to harvest locally.  yeah, i know, these words are overused, over-marketed, over-everything but it's true! this arrangement includes cafe au lait dahlias, other lavender / purple dahlias (i have at least 5 varieties in there), hydrangea, birch branches, pokeweed and a few gomphrena and cosmos.