Sarah Bernhardt Peonies - Cut Flowers - May 2024

It is peony season around here.  

When we were first dating, Nat was a blogger.  Her url was iheartpeonies dot com.  The very first thing that we planted in our first garden was a Sarah Bernhardt peony that was a division from Nat's mom's garden.  The story goes that the peony was her great aunt's peony that had been divided a number of times to be planted in various family member's gardens.  

That peony ended up back in Nat's Mom's garden when we moved out.  I said - back in 2017 - that it was being 'fostered'.  But, it has stayed there these seven-plus years.  

Our new garden didn't have any peonies.  Until 2018 when I bought a couple of tubers.  The first one was Sarah Bernhardt.  The pink peony that you think of when you think of peonies.  It has moved around a few times, but ended up IB2DWS and has grown quite a bit up there.  Last year (2023), I declared was our first REAL 'Peony Season'.  It was the first time that we had blooms; or at least enough blooms to cut and bring inside.  That was early June.  

This year, the Sarah Berhardt peony really pop'd off.  And gave us enough to fill a vase.  See below for a few photos:

In the back, we have a couple of other peony tubers - a darker pink Karl Rosenfield peony and a white Duchesse de Nemours peony (the standard white one).  Both produced just a couple of small flowers last year. This year, they're doubling - so we'll get four-to-five white ones and a couple of dark pink blooms.  I'll cut those and bring them in soon.

A few weeks back, I moved a volunteer peony from the deep shade to the new conifer garden IB2DWs...and...as we know, peonies hate being moved.  They know they've been moved and are big divas about the whole thing.  I suspect that one won't flower this year, won't flower next year and if I'm lucky...will produce blooms in 2026.  

I said 2024 needed to be a year of flowers, so perhaps I should go find some peonies at the nursery that have already bloomed and are being discounted since their 'season' has passed.