Christmas Flower

Rosemary (Salvia rosmarinus) is a fragrant herb that grows as a perennial rounded evergreen shrub. It features slender, needle-like, gray-green leaves on erect woody stems. And it produces clusters of small, light blue to white flowers typically in the late spring to early summer, though it can bloom at other points of the year as well. Plant rosemary in the spring after any threat of frost has passed. The shrub has a moderate growth rate. It will reach its mature size and begin flowering in its second season.

As hedge bushes go, this one is stellar for sculpting in a narrow-depth space - and shearing for a very tidy, manicured look. In other words, a neat freak's garden nirvana.

It's so easy to shape that this plant is used for topiaries.

Moneywort is a creeping perennial broadleaf weed that is also commonly known as Creeping Loosestrife, Yellow Myrtle, Creeping Jenny, Creeping Charlie, Herb Twopence and Two-penny Grass. Its scientific name is Lysimachia nummularia.

Moneywort forms mats of laterally branched stems and can be easily identified by the smooth, glandular dots on the surface of its leaves. This broadleaf weed also has short petioles and stems that root at the nodes, producing a shallow root system. Moneywort is sometimes sold in nurseries as a ground cover. Moneywort also has bright-yellow flowers that are produced individually on stalks in the leaf axils.

Although we are most accustomed to seeing graceful ferns throughout woodlands and forests where they nestle under tree canopies, they are equally attractive when used in the shady home garden.