It’s that time of year when I know I have so many friends who are itching to plant something pretty that they can enjoy all summer! Just going to the garden center and trying to pick something out can be overwhelming, and I’ve had so many friends lately ask for suggestions of different plants and wanting thoughts on where to start. So, here’s my suggestion if you’re TOTALLY overwhelmed. Start with a few pots.

You can buy pretty inexpensive pots at Home Depot, Lowe’s, Costco, even Target. If you want a nice pot, garden centers have LOADS of them. Many of them will have sales from time to time that you can even get a deal on a nice flower pot. But if you’re not really wanting to fully commit to anything yet, get a big inexpensive pot, and give it a shot for a season. You might surprise yourself!

First off, a few fundamentals:

-1- Pick your pot, and make sure it has drainage in the bottom. That is, I’m assuming you’re putting this pot outside, so make sure there’s a drainage hole in the bottom of your pot. You want excess water to be able to run off. When water just sits in the pot, it’s really common that it can cause root rot and kill your plants.

-2- Pick your pot placement spot and take note of the amount of sun it gets. 6+ hours a day equates to a full sun, 4-6 hours a day equates to part shade, less than that is shade. The very first year I started gardening, I didn’t really pay attention to sunlight and figured that if you had the willpower, you could for the most part make things work where you put them. That’s so wrong. I wasted so much money trying to keep part sun plants alive in a full sun spot, and they looked terrible all season despite my best efforts.

-2a- The sub-part to the second item above. Choose plants that actually match the amount of sun you get! If you’re lost, ask a garden center associate. They are usually huge garden lovers and have great ideas about what works best where you live!

-3- Choose a color scheme. Take into consideration the color of your pot, what else it’s going to be by, color of your house even. There are loads of articles on flower color scheme, but the gist is don’t try to put the entire rainbow in one pot. Choose complimentary colors. For example, I like to do purples and pinks together in my backyard pots, but I combine yellow and purple in my front yard.

Greens and whites are neutral. You can put them with anything!

-4- Consider the mature size of the plant. Those little tags in the plant at the garden center indicate the mature size of the plant. You don’t want to fill 100% of all free space of a pot when you initially plant it. It will look like an overgrown mess by the end of the summer because you didn’t allow your plants room to grow, so give them some space to grow up!

Ok, here we go. Large pots generally need three different players in them. A thriller, a filler, and a spiller. Here’s what you want to fill your pot with:

Thriller: Plants that are thrillers are ones that add height and drama. They’re your vertical element to the plant. If you’re planting a pot that’s going to be viewed from all sides, the thriller generally goes in the middle. If you’re planting a pot that’s only going to be viewed from one primary angle, put that thriller on the back side off to the side.

I’ve used grasses, coleus, flowering plants, and even herbs as my thriller that have tall frilly tops as my thriller.

Filler: These are the plants that fill the pot. They are the next step down on your height scale from the thriller. These guys add interest and fill space. Almost any flowering plant can be a filler, but keep in mind the height. It visually needs to be shorter than your thriller.

Spiller: These are the plants that spill over the side of the container. The next and last visual step down from your filler plants. I love using verbena, million bells, and sweet potato vines as my spillers. They trail over the side of the pot.

When you go to plant, make sure you use potting soil (yes, it really does need to be potting soil and not just plain old dirt), and then lay out your plants in the container before planting them into the soil. Play with them until they look right to you, and then get them in dirt and give them some fertilizer and good water when done. It’s an experiment to figure out what works well for you and what doesn’t, so if it doesn’t look perfect this time around, you can always pull something out of the pot and replace it with something different!

Here’s another example labeled, although with this pot my thriller and spiller overtook my filler so about mid-season, I just took it out. Never be afraid to change things mid-season if something is just not working.

Have questions, advice, or I completely missed something important? Drop it in the comments, please! Happy spring planting, friends!