I always enjoy putting an assortment of colorful plants in containers for the summer months and my mind had departed this dreary month of January to a more colorful time. I'm visualizing my pots for the warmer months with some interesting plant partnerships that include colorful tropical plants and brightly flowered annuals. The word tropical usually puts one in a mental space alongside orchids, bougainvillea and hibiscus and admittedly its a wonderful space to occupy in January. Add colorful coleus foliage in bright acid yellows with dark purple sword-like leaves of New Zealand flax and I suddenly feel warmer. Trail some of the fancy new petunias down the sides with verbena blossoms poking out in slightly lighter shades and my pot has just increased a size.

The pot will come from Malaysia or Vietnam with a rich glaze that will appear to pour down the sides in a teal that turns turquoise blue. There should be a few bromeliads alongside the orchids which will be exchanged frequently for freshly budded varieties and their flowers will send out the most sumptuous fragrance, stronger at night to lure large moths for pollination. My hibiscus will have flowers that open to at least eight inches and have a pearlescent quality with soft pink and lavender deep in the throat. Infrequently, (but frequently enough) a soft green tree frog will rest in a prominent hibiscus flower and I have to point him out to company and hope that he doesn't eat the moths that visit at night to pollinate the orchids. The bougainvilleas will be bright pink and support a rare red flowering passion vine that only blooms in June when the summer days are at their longest. The passion vine will delicately wrap around the spiny branches of the bougainvillea which will flower so much that you have to sweep around the bottom of the pot at least twice a week, before company visits. Sometimes the evening breezes are so strong that the flowers are blown away by morning and they look picture perfect at the feet of the pink flamingos that travel through the green lawn that is surrounded by a garden filled with palm trees and tree ferns. I will admire all of this as my water fountain provides the perfect resonance of water falling into a marble fountain where the tropical waterlilies bloom everyday in rich tones of lavender and blue. Wow, that was fun!