First Monday Vase of 2026

Tonight is twelfth night but knowing that we were having a very hard frost again, and that the snowdrops will be flat on the floor again till they thaw out around lunch time, I picked today's flowers yesterday and photographed them then.

It took me some time to find a vase to display these snowdrops, as well as the one rose from Rosa Munstead Wood which has been in 'suspended animation' for the last few weeks.  The snowdrop at a little more than 30cm for the longest stem is living up to its name of 'Colossus'.  My usual vases for snowdrops would have needed me to cut off most of the stems which would have not shown the snowdrops in their full glory. 

The vase on the left has the longest stems and the one on the right the slightly shorter ones, but they are all from Galanthus plicatus 'Colossus' with the smaller of the blooms appearing as the second flower growing from the same bulb that produced the first larger and longer stemmed flower. It is not usual for snowdrops to produce more than one stem and flower from each bulb.

Galanthus plicatus Colossus close up

When we clear away the decorations this evening, the mantle shelf will be the last place to be cleared and this arrangement will certainly last a few more days. Then the fir cone on its little branch and the lichen encrusted twig will be more apparent.  These last two were little treasured finds from walks a few weeks ago.  I am one of those people who find little things on walks and just cannot resist bringing them home like trophies, a bit like a dog on a walk wanting to bring home a stick. I mention these as on Six on Saturday this week, my SOS sister 'Off the Edge Gardening' whom I have never met, seems to have such similar tastes we often make a joke of this. Fir cones and lichen were mentioned last Saturday on her post hence my kitchen windowsill trophies made it into IAVOM.

Thanks to Cathy who devised and has led IAVOM for many years, we and that could be you too, link in our posts over onto her weekly one.  Happy New Year everyone on In a Vase on Monday.