Picking Sunflowers for the Deck's Fall Mantel

There's all kinds of wildflowers that grow along the roadside here in Eastern New Mexico and right now the sunflowers are in bloom.
 H put two buckets of water in the back of the Yukon and off we went to pick sunflowers on the country roads not far from where we live.

If you look behind the settee on the left,    you can see one of the buckets  that we put our flowers in.      I still have quite a few flowers left to decorate with.

I love how I can make an indoor/outdoor area by opening the french doors.

All the flowers in my floral design are either wild flowers I picked in the country or flowers I cut from our bushes in the back yard.

I love to use unique containers to create my designs and this time I chose a vintage mop bucket.

I bet those old rollers have seen plenty of use in the past.

Here is the roadside where I picked most of my flowers.     

On the left is the green bucket that I put the white flowers in.

This wildfllower reminds me of baby's sbreath with a sunflower twist...lol!.      

I filled my mop bucket with this flower first and then just stuck the other flowers in.    All the little cross stems hold the other flowers in place pretty good!

These sunflowers are in a old metal trash can that H used to have in his office back in the day!

I have a metal pumpkin on each side of the floral design.

Next to the pumpkins are pots of white mum's that I sat in olive buckets and the final touch is a yellow pickup.     In the background you can see all the ivy growing on the fence...... 

The ivy has covered the fence and is now becoming ground cover....lol!

I claim the pink and cream buffalo check blanket and the  sweet cow with a sunflower in her mouth.     Although the temps during the day here in Eastern New Mexico are in the 80's and 90's,    when the sun goes down the temps drop to the 60's so I keep a blanket handy in case I need it.

I had a few flowers left with the stems too short to reach the water in my mop bucket,   so I put them in a glass of water.

H claims this blanket and pillow for cool nights on the deck.

I found these big pots of white mum's at Lowe's yesterday......2 for $10!

I like to take photo's of the deck from all angles,   and while I was taking this photo I smelled something oniony.....

I looked down and saw I got so busy concentrating on my photo that I stepped in the chive plants.

You can find pretty yellow sunflowers on the roadside around here.   but on a ride to Plainview Texas this past Tuesday I saw acre's of sunflowers planted in the fields.

I saw field after field of cotton.....then I spotted a couple of sunflowers fields.

These fields of sunflowers still need a few more weeks before they will be in bloom......

This is how they will look then!     I took this photo a couple of summers ago when I was in the area.

I think H and I will have lunch on the deck today........