What’s in your yard — lady in red hydrangea that displays a deep red in flowers, leaves and stems or Laura Pedlum with a fushia firework bloom where the foliage turns to a burgundy color in summer and fall? 

Katy Overby, Prince Edward County Extension agent for horticulture, spoke to the Nora Lancaster Garden Club in November on “Gathering from Your Landscape to Make Arrangements.”  Katy is from Lunenburg County and holds a degree in horticulture with landscape contracting. 

Her presentation demonstrated how cost-effective and easy it is to gather different foliage to provide a variety of flowers and greenery for arrangements such as boxwood, pine, Arizona cypress, rosemary, variegated ligustrum or weigela.  There are rules but no rules — use items from around the house!

Katy demonstrated how to take a Thanksgiving theme and quickly replace a few items to make it ready for Christmas. She likes to apply the concept of spiller (what spills over the sides), thriller (what thrills/pops out), pillar (what adds height) and filler (what fills in).

Awards for artistic and horticulture arrangements successively are: Helen Smith-one blue, Betty Coleman-one blue and one blue, Brenda Puryear-one red and one blue, Jane Crute-two blue and Becky Kelly-one blue and one blue.