A Summer Garden Floral Arrangement

In late summer our garden is filled with robust blooms of pink dinner plate dahlias and carpet roses.  They seem to thrive on even the hottest of days and are a joy to arrange and bring indoors.  Fresh flowers always add such life to a room!

To create this arrangement,  in the early morning hours I cut several stems of carpet roses, a few sprigs of miniature roses, three or four fading hydrangea blooms and a couple of dazzling pink dahlias.

After removing the lower leaves from the stems and trimming the thorns from the roses, I placed them in a simple pottery vase.  Then hydrangeas were mixed with the roses for texture and to provide structure for the arrangement.

The dahlia blooms were added last to create a focal point in the arrangement.  These large unscented flowers make such a dramatic statement as a finishing touch.  Finally, a few loose sprigs of cherry laurel were worked in to the empty spaces for texture and to complete the design.