Can you help me please?

[LightsOff]

I have never done any gardening in my life . I have two borders and i would like some flowers in them but i don't have a clue.
I was going to buy seeds but it is probably too late, how long does it take untill you have flowers?

Is the best and easiest way to buy ready ones? The websites have 'flower plants' and 'flower bulbs', what do i need, what's the difference? Can you suggest any that flowers from now till Sept?

What else do i need? A bag of compost and then i just plant them there?

[purepurple]

Go to the garden centre and buy a few bedding plants and plant them in your borders. They will grow over the summer. When they have died in the autumn dig them up and plant some bulbs such as snowdrops, daffidils and crocus that will flower in the spring. You can leave the bulbs in the ground and then just plant new bedding plants next year.
Or you can use mini propagators and raise your own bedding plants from seeds.

[mumblechum1]

What purepurple said. Thinking longer term, you could put some perennials in for next year which will come back year after year. These would include things like peonies, roses, delphiniums, lupins, guems etc. BAsically, once perennials are in they keep doing their thing with minimal effort

For this year though, bedding plants will give you some colour for the summer, and as pp says, get some bulbs in in autumn for spring flowers like daffodils, tulips, muscari, hyacinths, snowdrops etc etc.

When you put the bedding plants in, dig a hole about as deep as the pots they come in, put half a trowel of compost into the hole, put the plant in carefully, tuck it in with soil & compost & water generously.

[Carrotsandcelery]

Another mumsnetter, Voldemortsnipple has ordered something like this and has just planted it just now

I think a lot of these flowers would come back year after year and they come as bare root plants which you just plant according to the plan that comes with it.

She is on the reluctant gardener's thread if you want to ask her about it.

[ComeIntoTheGardenMaud]

The school fete season is about to start. Go to as many as you can and head for the plant stall - there are always lovely things to be had at bargain prices.

[LightsOff]

Lovely ideas, thank you so much

[Dazmum]

Penstemons are nice, lots of colours, and could go in now to come back year after year, and geraniums ( not pelargoniums) as ground cover. They grow in clumps, anywhere and you can pull bits off of them and stick them in bare patches. Good for shade too. Dahlias would be good from now until the frosts. Hardy fuschias will form bushes and die back in the winter, sprouting from the bottom in spring.