Buy Irish! An Irish poinsettia is likely to be bigger, and have a longer shelf life
I'd like to start with a patriotic plug this week - for poinsettias. Please buy Irish. About half of the plants that are for sale this Christmas are Dutch-grown. You'll find these mainly in supermarkets, and while they may be cheaper than their Irish counterparts, that may be their only advantage. To be sure, they are likely to be expertly grown (the Dutch are among the best nurserymen in the world), but the poinsettia is a fragile creature, and doesn't like to travel. The mother of all today's bedazzling cultivars, Euphorbia pulcherrima (closely related to our garden spurges), is a shrub or small tree, native to Mexico. On its home turf it enjoys balmy, frost-free conditions, which is why all the poinsettias that you'll find for sale in our more northerly part of the world have been raised in glasshouses. The less time a plant spends in transit between glasshouse and your house, the better.
Because an Irish-grown poinsettia travels a relatively short distance, and is subjected to less trauma during its journey, it is likely to have a longer shelf life, and probably won't surprise you horribly by dropping its leaves on Christmas Eve. Also, I'm told that most of the plants that are grown here are fuller and larger: apparently, consumers in continental Europe favour smaller plants than we do, and the imports that we receive have been grown to suit that market.
When you buy your poinsettia, mollycoddle it every minute that it is out in the cold on its way to its new home: make sure that it is protected by a polythene sleeve, or nestled into a large bag. And don't ever be tempted by displays of these tropical beauties outside shops - such specimens are no more that plant corpses in waiting. Both cold draughts and hot blasts from radiators are liable to make these lily-livered fusspots unwell, so the best environment in the home is where there is a steady daytime temperature of 15 to 21 degrees, and a night-time temperature of about 12 degrees. Water the compost when it becomes dry, and if your house is hot and arid over Christmas, the plant will thank you if you mist it occasionally to raise the humidity.
But let's leave the persnickety poinsettia aside, and think about a bit of ornamentation for the rest of the house. Carol Bone, one of this country's top floral artists (she decorates Farmleigh each year, as well as a host of other posh venues), says that natural materials are still "in". Holly, ivy and berries are all the rage. The crabapple crop, she notes, has been particularly good this year, and gardeners with Malus trees in their gardens might sacrifice the last few fruits on the branches, wire them up and fasten them to wreaths or garlands.
If you want to use non-home-grown components in your decorations, then little satsumas studded with cloves fit in with this year's trend of including some orange into a colour scheme. Bronzy tones for baubles and ribbons are also de rigueur. They are easier on the eye than gold, and combine nicely with the soft and chintzy tones of faded hydrangeas and other garden gleanings. In wreaths, says Carol, fir and conifer foliage is being supplanted by that of other evergreens such as ivy, eucalyptus and yew. Tinsel, that jolliest of Christmas decorations, is still in the fashion doghouse - so if you care about these things, leave it out of your festive designs.
Our own wreath this year is, as usual, a concoction of stuff plundered from the garden. I used just one kind of foliage - bay - and garnished it with cotoneaster berries, hydrangea, birch twigs and dried teasel heads. I'm afraid that I made it before I heard the message about bronze being chic, and my birch twigs and teasel had already got a blast of the gold spray can (and I had a minor instance of silver attack also). But never mind, I had great entertainment making it: there's something pleasingly earthy and crafty about creating one's own wreath or garland.
Even tying up a few bits of holly, ivy or other evergreenery with a ribbon can help us to celebrate the end of the year a little closer to nature.